


Take It All Away

by Theblueeyedvampire



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Blood and Gore, Episode: s03e12 Helpless, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-07-20 00:01:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 45,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7382893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theblueeyedvampire/pseuds/Theblueeyedvampire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Re-write of episode 3.12 "Helpless". Spike never returns to Dru in South America, instead deciding to resurrect his original intentions to kill his third Slayer... and preferably Angel too. But when he arrives back in Sunnydale and finds Buffy in the midst of her Cruciamentum, he can’t bring himself to take advantage of her weakened state.  Nominated in Sunnydale Memorial Fanfic Awards, round 31.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Plaything

**Author's Note:**

> Story Notes: Everything connected with Buffy the Vampire Slayer belongs to the genius that is Joss Whedon (and, you know, his writing team and Mutant Enemy and the networks). I just snatch them out of his sandbox and play with them. No copyright infringement intended. This story was originally published June-Nov 2013 on fanfiction.net and re-edited for Elysian Fields in 2014. There are 11 chapters, and I will attempt to update weekly.

Chapter 1: Plaything

**... South America, four months previously...**

“She brought blackness upon us,” Drusilla moans, a hand languishing across her brow like a wilting flower.

Spike turns away and lights another cigarette. _Bollocks, goin’ through that pack faster than I meant to. Haven’t got much of the stuff left_.

Drusilla eyes him petulantly. “You couldn’t ever do it.”

_That’s it. That’s bloody it._

Shoving out of his rickety chair, Spike paces in front of the outdoor café, glaring up at the sky as he speaks, too disgusted to look at Drusilla.

“So, Sunnyhell was not our finest hour. And _yes_ , I made a deal with the Slayer. But _you_ were shaggin’ Angelus _and_ bringin’ about an apocalypse to end all life as we know it. So? Every couple’s got... their ups and downs... Point bein’, we got through all that. It’s behind us now... isn’t it?”

He’s trying. God knows, he’s trying harder than any reasonable man should be expected to try... after seeing his black beauty with that... _thing_.

“I hate it here,” Dru pouts. “Furry little animals peering at us from out of the trees, and the people taste all funny...”

“Right,” he sighs deeply, dropping his rapidly-consumed cigarette to the ground and stamping the butt into powder. “We’ll pick up and move again, and we’ll keep movin’ ‘till we’ve found the perfect spot... and then you can be my queen again, and I’ll be your little prince... your William.”

Neck tensing with effort, he reaches for her hand, but her fingers slip away from him.

“Princess... just tell me what you want,” Spike pleads, at his wits' end.

Drusilla stares into his gemstone eyes, her face more lucid than he’s seen it in years, perhaps ever.

“I want the Slayer dead, Spike,” is all she says.

Losing control altogether, Spike flips over the chair he’d formerly occupied and sends it spinning in multiple pieces down the dirt lane.

“ _You’re_ the one who keeps bringin’ her up! I haven’t said a word about the bloody Slayer since we left California! She’s on the other side of the planet, Dru!”

“But you’re lying!” Drusilla snarls, also rising from her chair, eyes cold, unforgiving. “I can still see her, floating all around you, laughing! Why don’t you push her away?”

“But I _did_ , pet,” he whispers, lifting his hands helplessly. “I did it for you. You keep punishin’ me, carryin’ on with creatures like this.”

On the other side of the table, a very frightened Chaos demon – all slime and antlers – gestures its cloven hand between the arguing lovers.

“Okay...” the creature petitions, “you guys obviously have a thing going on here...”

Drusilla can’t even meet Spike’s gaze now. “I have to find my pleasures, Spike. You taste like ashes.”

“So this is _my_ fault now?” Spike scoffs, glancing from his sire to the seven-foot monstrosity, the myriad points on its antlers dripping and oozing some foul-smelling molasses-like substance. When he’d seen his beloved snogging the thing, he’d almost welcomed a stake, would have guided it straight to his heart had any being in this God-forsaken jungle tried to attack him. Every movement since then had felt stiff, painful, like his muscles and bones are already turning to dust. Despair fills him, the axis of his world spinning around with no true north anymore, no center of gravity.

The Chaos demon, off Spike’s fearsome glower, backs up a step.

“I didn’t know she was seeing somebody... I should take off.”

“Yeah, why don’t you do that?” Spike growls. _Get the hell out of here before I act on the urge to snap your pathetic, gooey neck._

Unbelievable. The brute still has the gumption to blow a kiss towards Drusilla – the motion obscured somewhat by its hoofed hand – before it turns its back on them and walks briskly away.

“You can’t blame the girl, Spike,” Dru chides. “You’re all covered with her. I look at you... all I see is the Slayer.”

“Wasn’t blamin’ no one, ‘cept maybe _you_ , mackin’ on that... that digustin’ thing.”

All the fight leaking out of him, Spike sits roughly on the edge of the café’s patio and rests his head on his knees.

“You can’t play any of our games anymore, Spike,” mumbles Drusilla, descending back into the nether regions of her labyrinthine mind. “You’ve forgotten all the rules. All the puppets’ strings are cut, and they lay on the floor and don’t dance for the little happy children.”

“I don’t understand,” Spike moans into his hands. “I did it for you, luv. For us. All those months I had to sit there in that bleedin’ chair and... and listen.”

His voice breaks, head pounding with memories so sickening that his hands start to tremble. The repetitive creaking of the bed... Angelus’s loud oaths as he bedded her, rough as he always was... Drusilla moaning cheerfully and responsively for her ‘Daddy’...

“Don’t you love me, Dru?” begs Spike, standing up suddenly. He rushes in front of Drusilla, kneels, and clutches for her hands. Her gaze remains on the treetops surrounding them. “I’ve forgiven you, baby. I know you couldn’t help it, you didn’t mean to hurt me. He’s your sire. You’re bound to him, like I to you... but you love _me_ , right, pet? Princess?”

Her lids flutter, but still she does not condescend to look upon him.

“My pretty plaything has run away, off to another dolly-house... and let another little girl pick him up...”

Is that really all he’s ever been to her? A plaything? A game? A puppet?

“No, baby, no... I’m yours. I love you. Drusilla! Dammit, why won’t you look at me?”

He can’t hold back the tears. They stem not from his eyes but from his heart, seemingly gashed open, hacked to bits. Her hands glide out of his once again, and he watches the hem of her yellow dressing gown move further and further away.

“Dru... Dru, please...”

“No more, pretty Willy... run along now and play with your new little girl.” A brief chorus of giggles consumes her. “Little Willy can never have his own girl, can he? All his girls belong to another. Second fiddle said to the violin, let me watch you play, please? If I do all my lessons, will you help me do better next time? Not so many blots in my copybook...”

Her voice is fading, her tiny footfalls on the dirt path growing fainter with each step, but Spike remains on the ground beside the table. His legs have shed all their strength. He’s half-inclined to just stay here in this pose until dawn and let the sun put him out of his misery.

Drusilla is truly gone. Her scent in the air is all that lingers, decorating the chair and table and the bits of dirt her feet trod on, the perfume that – until now – had fueled his existence.

“Please...” he murmurs to the ground of the empty clearing. “Please come back to me...”

**... Highway south of Sunnydale, present...**

“Gahh!”

Headlights careen toward him, and Spike jerks the wheel of the DeSoto until he’s safely out of the flow of oncoming traffic.

“Great... live a hundred years... only to die in a bleedin’ car crash,” he mutters, pulling over onto the right shoulder, shifting to park, and rubbing his aching forehead.

The memory of his last words with Dru become more vivid every time he closes his eyes now, probably because he’s well and truly sober for the first time in months. Out of liquor, out of smokes... nothing but a pounding headache to get him all the way back to Where-in-the-Hell, Brazil, find Dru, tire her up, and torture her until she likes him again. Simple-enough plan... so why doesn’t he feel like it will do a bloody bit of good? Who knows how many repulsive pick-your-flavor demons she’ll have shacked up with by now? All because of the Slayer... because of stupid, prissy Buffy Summers...

Spike shifts around in the driver’s seat, trying to find an angle that mollifies his headache in any way, but the throbbing only increases.

Was that really all it took to eradicate a hundred-year-long bond, the closest thing to sacred a vampire could experience – the tie between sire and childe? One brief allegiance with the Slayer, and suddenly Dru considered him too tainted to look upon, too fouled to caress...

And seeing _her_ again... with _him_ , both alive, pretending not only that all his gruesome atrocities against her kith and kin hadn’t happened, but also that they weren’t making googly eyes at one another every bleedin’ second. Spike had seen what Angelus had done to the Watcher – hell, he had stopped _more_ harm from coming to the faithful bloke – but he supposes that Buffy’s rose-colored glasses wipe all of Angel’s stains clean. Poor little girl... she has no idea the heat of the fire she’s playing with.

His headache only growing worse, Spike thumps his forehead against the steering wheel.

_Not ‘poor girl’, you nit_ , he derides himself. _Stupid bint of a girl! Walkin’ straight into his bloody hands_... _and he’ll use her... and laugh as he tears her pretty flesh... my Slayer...  
_

“Oh God... no...”

Spike bolts up, clapping both hands to his head, not to appease the pain in his sinuses, but to try to gouge out the sudden horror.

“Please no...”

He’s lost. He’s falling for the Slayer.

_To be continued..._


	2. Questioning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note that the timeline is slightly rearranged, so that at this point Buffy has already been "swatted down by some no-neck and rescued by Cordelia," so that rumors of her weakness have begun to flit around the demon underground. All direct "Helpless" quotes written by David Fury.

Chapter 2: Questioning

Spike’s brain seems to be on pause, incapable of any thought except the bare minimum necessary to keep his DeSoto between the white and yellow pavement markings, his hands clenching the steering wheel so tightly that his fingers are even more unnaturally pale than usual and his tendons bulge like cables beneath his skin. Exits whisk past as he plows down the highway in the dead of night, utterly ignoring the speed limit and the honks and obscene gestures of the drivers he cuts off. When the ramp for Sunnydale appears on the right, he swerves across three lanes and barrels up onto the side street, running the first two red lights – and only then does the police car appear, lights blaring behind him, honking for him to pull over. Rolling his eyes, Spike plows straight through the illuminated ‘WELCOME to SUNNYDALE’ sign and, with a squeal of brakes, stops the car at last, gently bumping the curb.

“Driver of the black sedan, step out of the vehicle with your hands up!” grinds the megaphone-enhanced voice of the policeman, halting about a dozen yards away from Spike’s car, patriotic lights still rotating.

With a churlish huff, Spike pushes open the car door, rises to his feet, and slams it shut, glaring toward the cop car without much interest, his hands defiantly on his hips.

“What? This is my spot. I had it reserved,” he drawls.

“I said, put your hands up!” says the solitary occupant of the police car, significantly less powerfully now that he’s emerged from his own auto. He’s a balding man in his mid-forties, and rather stout.

_Great. First meal back, and it’s gonna taste of cheap doughnuts and lipids_ , is all Spike allows himself to think before he shuts his brain on angry autopilot again.

“Don’t feel like it,” he sasses, anchoring his hands on his belt. “Who in soddin’ hell decided to put the city’s meet-an’-greet sign right square in the middle of the bleedin’ parkin’ lot anyway, eh?! What kind of half-knackered demon designed this soddin’ town?”

The policeman’s trembling fingers raise a handgun. “Get on your knees and put your hands behind your head! I’m warning you!”

Spike laughs at the sky, a sharp rippling laugh, like lightning.

“Oh, sure. Warn me of what, mate? That you’re ‘bout to piss your trousers?”

“Get on the GROUND!”

“Guess what, chum, can’t scare me with your oh-so-threatenin’ lookin’ pistol! Just turn around and mind your own –”

_BANG_!

Spike reels, his left arm in nearly as much pain as when he’d woken up on fire last month.

“Oi!” he shouts at the twitching policeman whose face is now hazed by smoke. “Bloody hell! You shot me, you bastard!”

And then he pounces, fangs emerging, forehead crinkling, eyes flaring yellow. Leaping over the cop car, he catches the policeman’s hand, bends it back until he hears a soft _snap_ and the pistol drops to the pavement with a clatter, and then plunges his teeth into the man’s pudgy throat.

The blood is mediocre – all processed sugar and spam and greasy burgers – but it’s life, and rich in fear and shock, a slight tang than makes it worth drinking. One hand still clenched around the policeman’s broken wrist, Spike shakes the man by the neck as he relentlessly siphons his blood, swallow after swallow. He feels his own shoulder growing stickier as some of the fresh plasma flows to the bullet wound, but the pain lessens with each gulp. In his ear he catches the fluttering gurgle of the man’s final breath, then he draws one more mouthful and lets the body flop to the asphalt, ashen and empty. Licking his lips clean, Spike cracks his neck back and forth.

“Oh, and I’ll have that as well,” he says flippantly to the corpse, ferreting in his shirt pocket and withdrawing a half-full pack of Marlboros, then filching all the bills from the dead man’s wallet. He extracts one cigarette, pulls out his trusty Zippo lighter, holds the flame to the tip, and inhales a welcomed puff of nicotine.

“Home sweet home,” he murmurs darkly. “God, I hate this place.”

Then, leaving the body and the still-flashing police car behind him, Spike stalks off, his gait panther-like and dominant.

* * *

 

Willy quails visibly when Spike storms into his bar, nearly detaching the front door from its hinges and earning awed stares from numerous patrons. The vampire – face still ridged and demonic – slams a fist down on the counter, then opens it to reveal a crumpled five dollar bill.

“Double shot of O’ Neg, ‘keep. An’ make it the good stuff. I don’t want no soddin’ orangutan.”

“G-g-got ya, friend,” Willy blabbers, nodding enthusiastically. He pours the blood from a hefty glass flask and hands it over, and Spike tips it up instantly, eager to rinse his mouth from the doughnuts-and-burgers taste.

“Keep hearing things about you, Spike ol’ buddy,” Willy shrugs, attempting to hide his jitteriness with a chipper tone. “People say you’re in town, then you’re not, but now obviously you’re back...”

“Remembered somethin’ I had to clear up. Unfinished business,” Spike mutters into the empty shot glass, trailing a black-tipped fingernail around the rim. He scowls at the illuminated sign amidst the glasses, reminded of how disgusted he is that this pathetic ferret shares his human name.

“Also heard...” Willy prattles on, “could be a complete rumor, of course... that you might be having a bit of lady trouble...”

Spike thrusts out a hand, seizes a fistful of Willy’s collar, and drags him back half-way across the countertop. Fangs barred, he gives a ruthless, guttural snarl.

“You... shut your face... or I’ll do it for you. Got that?”

“Yeah! Yeah, sure! Just put me down! I won’t say a word!”

Spike roughly shoves the petite barkeeper back on the opposite side of the counter. “Like you could keep your gob shut for more than three soddin’ seconds at a time,” he snorts, lighting another cigarette.

“B-but not a word on your personal life. No sir’ee, none of my business. So... word around town is some suits from your country have brought in Kralik to challenge the Slayer.”

The warm blood pumping through Spike’s veins turns to ice.

“That right?” he says disinterestedly, looking up at Willy through the vapor of his smoke.

“Sure as I’m standing here, buddy. Got him caged up at the Sunnydale Arms, that abandoned boarding house on the edge of town. Waiting for the right time, I expect.”

Spike makes a careless noise in the back of his throat. “Eh, the little superpowered bint will off him just like she does with the rest of ‘em.”

“Well, that’s the thing, you see,” Willy leans in, whispering. “The other word is... Slayer’s off her game. Sick or something.”

“Rubbish,” Spike dismisses. “Saw her not a month ago. All perky and spoutin’ awful puns, as per usual. Nothin’ wrong with the tart.”

“You’re pro’ly right,” concedes Willy, too afraid of enraging the vampire again. “Still... nice thought it must be for you, just _if_ it’s true, and the Slayer is weak. Bet a lot of demons in this town would be thrilled.”

_And that’s where you’re wrong, mate_. _Nobody gets to take out the Slayer ‘cept me... so if I say she lives to pun another day, she bloody-well better live._

“Gimme another shot,” Spike demands, tossing another fiver onto the bar counter. _Time to go visit Angelus_...

* * *

In her bedroom on the second floor of 1630 Revello Drive, Buffy unfolds the crumpled and as-yet unread birthday note from her father, smoothes it out, and places it and the ice show tickets on her dresser. Slipping into a more comfortable slaying outfit, she busies herself with her hairbrush, continuing until her blond locks are nearly straight.

“Stupid quarterly projections,” she mutters, dashing a hand roughly under her eyes and smudging away her tears, but when she puts down her brush her hand continues shaking. “God, what’s happening to me?”

Chalking it up to disappointment over her absentee dad, Buffy reaches for the letter, deciding to put this sucker to rest once and for all. She slits it open with a fingernail and yanks out the card.

“ _Happy Birthday darling daughter_...” she reads in a cavalier tone, eyes skimming the note. “ _Eighteen is a special age... hope you and a friend can enjoy the ice show... miss you and sorry I couldn’t make it_... yeah, bet you are!” she snarls at the offensive scrap of paper. “Enjoy your weekend with your damn quarterly projections!”

Buffy splits the note into four jagged pieces before hurling them into her waste basket under her desk. She hauls her weapons bag out from beneath her bed, slips a stake into her pants pocket, and is about to climb out the window when she realizes sneaking out on her – for all intents and purposes – _only_ parent, who’s already put up with so much, is a pretty rotten thing to do. With a sigh, Buffy grabs her red overcoat out of her closet and heads into the second floor hallway.

“Mom?”

“In here, Buffy,” replies Joyce from the master bedroom. Buffy prods the door open to see her mother looking through art magazines spread all over her bed, scoping out trends for her gallery.

“Hey, I’m heading out. Training with Giles and then patrolling.”

Joyce smiles, trying to be understanding. “Guess being the Slayer doesn’t take a day off for your birthday, huh?”

“Nope. Evil’s still out there doing its evil stuff. But tomorrow night I’m gonna relax a bit, hang with Xander and Willow and Oz at the Bronze, and... then this weekend maybe we could have some Mom-Buffy time, watch girly movies and OD on popcorn and ice cream?”

“I’d love to, sweetie,” nods Mrs. Summers. She’ll do everything she can to overcome Buffy’s disappointment at missing her daddy-daughter ice-show date. Though she would never say it aloud, she’s pleased her former husband won’t have the chance to take away her daughter this year.

“If, um, if it’s okay with you, I’m gonna see if Mr. Giles has any interest in the ice-show-thingy,” Buffy shrugs. “Just ‘cuz, you know, we already have the tickets.”

“That’s an excellent idea, honey.”

“Okay. Goodnight, Mom.”

“Be safe...” Joyce calls as Buffy slips the door shut again.

_Be safe_. _Mom always says that... and I always think for a split-second that she’s talking about Angel..._

She remembers the shifty looks they’d exchanged after their wrestling tussle at his mansion the other night, the accidental innuendoes, the way she’d basically run out on him, embarrassed by her own guilty, naughty mind. She knows she shouldn’t even be going near him after the disaster that was Christmas, when he’d confessed how madly he desired her in a way they can never again experience. Maybe it was safer to go on continuing to avoid each other... but with that ‘safety’ came the heartache of being alone.

_But... ‘alone’ is going to catch up sooner or later_ , she realizes morosely. _It’s not like there’s any way we could have any kind of future together, especially with all the unsolvable sexual tension. Five months until high school graduation... and then what? Big-name school in some other state, if Mom has anything to say about it. And I know I saw that Case Western Reserve University flyer on Giles’s desk. Wouldn’t that be perfect, a good college in Cleveland, school and slaying... but no Angel..._

When she arrives at the library, Giles is already arranging the rainbow collection of crystals, and Buffy flops into her usual chair at the end of the table.

“My dad bailed on me,” she murmurs, working on her plaintive Bambi eyes. “No happy birthday for Buffy.”

Giles only glances at her for a moment, so the effect is useless.

“Oh, I’m so terribly sorry,” he replies, not to her, but into the box of crystals on the table. “I know how much you were looking forward to the ice show with your father.”

Trying to act innocent, Buffy folds her hands in her lap and fidgets in anticipation. Clearly, it’ll take more than just pity for the jilted birthday girl to convince him.

“You know, it’s not just cartoon characters. They do pieces from operas... and ballets... Brian Boitano, doing _Carmen_ , is a life changer,” she gushes. “Oh, he doesn’t actually play Carmen, but... a lot of sophisticated people go.”

Acting strangely preoccupied, Giles lifts out the massive blue mineral from his box.

“I thought we’d start with the Grounding Crystal again.”

“It’s usually something that _families_ do together,” Buffy hints, smiling at her Watcher.

He just scoots the nearly empty box to another part of the table and indicates the blue chunk of quartz.

“Now, look very carefully for the tiny flaw at its core.”

“If someone were free, they’d take their daughters... or their student... or their Slayer...”

She eyes him hopefully, but he seems entirely oblivious to her attempted pleading.

“Buffy, I think we should concentrate now. Look for the flaw at its center.”

Sighing reluctantly, Buffy turns her eyes on the blue crystal, but the longer she stares at it, trying to find the supposed flaw that Giles insists is there, the more she really couldn’t care less. Her mind wanders off into the ether. _Why am I so unimportant to my own dad? Why doesn’t Giles get it? Why am I having this weird wooziness?_

Giles’s hand suddenly parts the line of vision between her and the aggravating blue stone.

“What?” she asks, afraid she’s let her lack of interest in the vibration and meditation crystals show on her face. “Did I zone on you?” His half-hearted smile says she must have. “Sorry, must be this flu-bug I’m nursing.”

“Best take care of that,” he advises. “Why don’t you...”

“Call it a night. Good idea. See ya’.”

Brow narrowed, she stands up and shrugs her shoulders uneasily, heading for the door. Giles calls out “Good night” just as she departs, bundling herself a little warmer into her red coat.

* * *

Not so far away, a blue-eyed vampire prowls through the dark alleyways of Sunnydale, picking up faint whiffs of Slayer scent leading toward the mansion he knows Angelus occupies. His spine bristles as he draws ever nearer to his grandsire’s dwelling.

_What the bloody hell am I gonna say? Shouldn’t even be here in this bleedin’ awful town... Shouldn’t care one quid if the Slayer and my poofter of a grandsire hop back into bed together and raise hell all over again... and I sure as hell shouldn’t be entertainin’ lusty thoughts about the blonde bint myself. No, no, lust for the chase, that’s all. Thrill of the hunt, thrill of the kill... bag my third Slayer, that’s my only reason for being back in this bloody town..._

His thoughts do nothing to hamper the plodding of his heavy boots down the streets he loathes so much. Finally halting at the front door of the imposing estate house, Spike swiftly pounds his fist thrice, then steps back, licks his lips eagerly, and fixes his face in a sneer. He senses the approach of the older vampire long before the door opens.

“Spike!” Angel gasps.

“Evenin’, Gramps.”

_To be continued..._


	3. Monsters

Chapter 3: Monsters

“Gonna invite me in?” Spike taunts, leering as he leans into the doorframe. “Don’t need it, a’course, on account of this not bein’ a human’s home. Just givin’ you the chance to be polite. Gonna come in anyway.”

“What the hell are you doing back here?” demands Angel, his shoulders tensing like a bear roused from sleep by some campers intruding into his cave.

“Not very soul-ish of you to leave an ol’ chum like me standin’ on your doorstep, mate. You... you _are_ still all soul-ish, right? Not gettin’ smoochy with your Slayer-bunny?”

Angel growls menacingly, but Spike just chuckles.

“Touched a nerve? She dump you or somethin’, on account of you swearin’ off the cuddlin’?”

“I’m only going to ask you one more time, Spike. Why are you back in Sunnydale?”

Spike rolls his eyes, scoffing. “Not like you own the bleedin’ town, mate. I come an’ go as I please.”

“Get out.”

“Don’t reckon I will,” jeers the blond.

“Spike, I order you to –”

“Funny thing... I’ve decided to take this whole Dru-cheatin’-on-me affair in a positive light,” Spike interrupts with a snarky grin. “For the first time in my unlife... I’m out from under my dear sire’s wing. I’m on my own, self-employed as it were. An’... it’s brilliant! No responsibility, no accountin’ to anyone for my actions, including _you_ , Peaches, so don’t even start –”

Angel loses patience and shoves his hand against Spike’s chest, pushing him back from the doorway.

“Get out of here, Spike,” he glowers.

“Make me... poofter.”

The whispered jibe sets off his grandsire exactly like Spike predicts it will. The taller vampire’s hand shoots forward for his neck, but Spike ducks under Angel’s outstretched arm and dodges, slipping inside the foyer of the mansion.

“Kind of you to let me in, mate,” he chuckles sarcastically as Angel whips around in astonishment. “What’s the matter? Didn’t see that comin’? Too fast for you, old man?”

With a feral growl, Angel lunges at Spike, but the smaller, more agile vamp swerves to the side and trips him, sending Angel sprawling across the slick floor.

“Little rusty, aren’t you, Gramps? Little stint in hell make your muscles go all spongy?”

“Shut up!”

“Careful now...” Spike teases, side-stepping another charge. This time he jabs his fist into Angel’s jaw, landing a second punch to his ribs.

“Tsk tsk, I’m disappointed, Angel,” sniggers Spike as his opponent staggers backward, a hand around his ribcage. “I mean, I could tell a month ago you were off your game... but this is just delicious. Buffy’s precious white knight... gettin’ himself creamed by the Big Bad.”

“You’d never beat me in a fair fight,” Angel accuses, dark eyes full of rage and humiliation.

Spike shrugs his shoulders, then pops a quick fist into Angel’s cheek.

“Yeah, that’s the thing about bein’ evil. Don’t have to play fair ‘nless I feel like it. Which... I don’t.”

“You’re a coward!”

_Pow!_ Spike wallops Angel in the ribs again, and he hits the far wall with an audible “Oof!”

“ _I’m_ the coward? Who’s skulkin’ about in a concrete house gettin’ waited on hand-and-foot by the Slayer, whom you can’t even shack up with, thanks to your shiny lil’ soul?”

Spike paces in front of the fireplace, pivoting to continue facing Angel, who pants aggressively, arms around his aching ribs.

“Buffy doesn’t wait on me.”

“Sure...” Spike says with narrowed eyes. He dramatically holds a hand to his brow and raises the pitch of his voice, mimicking Buffy. “ _Oh! Oh, Angel! You’re so dark and mysterious, with your broody brow and your anti-gravity hair_...”

“Shut up, Spike!”

“ _Oh_ ,” he mocks, still in an affected tone. “ _I wish we could be together, Angel, but I’m a horny teenage Slayer who needs a good roll-in-the-hay from time to time_...”

Angel charges yet again, but Spike parries his shoulder-heavy punches and sends him flying backwards with an ax-kick to the gut. Angel slams into the wall and then the floor, and doesn’t rise, just glares up at Spike, wincing.

“Or...” Spike says in his own voice, “Is it _you_ that can’t take the heat? Too tempted when you’re with her? A little toss of her hair, a little bit of that silky bronze skin exposed... and you snap, the monster comes back out?”

“I love her! I’d never hurt her!”

“No, no, not one bit. Just kill one of her teachers, torture her Watcher. Yeah, never ever...”

“That wasn’t me!”

Spike throws back his head and laughs for a moment, knowing if Angel somehow manages to pull himself to his feet that he can respond to another attack in plenty of time.

“That excuse might work on the humans, chum, but I’m one of you. Vampire. Demon desires in a human core. I know what it feels like... the bloodlust, the cravin'. Powerful, yeah, but not some body-snatcher takin’ over you, usin’ your skin like you’d drive a car. You afraid to sit in the driver’s seat, Angelus?”

“Don’t call me that!”

“But it’s who you _are_ , the _real_ you, mate. Before you got all soul-y and self-condemning, there wasn’t a limit to the evil you’d dish out. Hell, did things even _I_ thought were too vile for anything that still walked on two legs and spoke like a man, but the point is, you didn’t do anything you didn’t want to do. No compunction, just a womanizin’ wastrel suddenly wieldin’ the strength of Hercules, actin’ outside of any human law. And now just look at you. Just a big fluffy puppy with bad teeth... what is _this?_ ”

Completely changing his tone of voice to one of utmost glee, Spike glances down at the floor by the fireplace to spot a thin package wrapped in brown cloth.

“Don’t touch that!”

Spike’s fingers have already slipped around the parcel by the time Angel shouts at him. He thumbs loose the knot of string and unwraps what turns out to be a copy of _Sonnets from the Portuguese_ , the love sonnets of E. B. Browning.

“Little light reading before beddy-bye?” he sneers, glancing skeptically down at his sire’s sire. “Or... present for our dear Buffy?”

“It’s her birthday tomorrow,” Angel mumbles sheepishly, grimacing as he rolls onto his knees and gingerly sits up. He doesn’t catch the ‘ _our’_ that had slipped unintentionally through Spike’s lips. “Wanted... to do something sweet.”

“Sure... love poems from a creature who can’t love her without losin’ his mask and rippin’ her head off...”

“You can’t possibly understand how I feel for Buffy!”

“Like your insides vanish every time you look at her?” Spike replies solemnly, refolding the cloth around the book of poems. “Like her smile’s your sun, only thing bringin’ light and life to you, but deadly all the same? Like... if anythin’ happened to her... you couldn’t drive a stake in your breast fast enough? Like you’d beat down the hellions that came to take you away, charge right up to the Pearly Gates, and demand her back?”

Angel’s brows narrow, but it’s obvious Spike has hit his mark. He’s stunned himself as well, confessing aloud the smatterings of idle thoughts that had tormented him all the way back from where he’d swerved his car off the highway after the realization had hit him for the first time. His words hang in the air between them like a lit fuse inching closer and closer to a stick of dynamite.

“How...?” Angel breathes.

“It’s how Dru makes me feel,” Spike quickly mutters, scuffing his steel-toed boots on the floor. “Or... used to, now that I’ve given her up.”

“She never loved _you_ ,” Angel sneers, finding a verbal weapon at last. “She loved _me_ , her sire, her creator.”

“And don’t I know it,” snarls Spike, dropping the re-wrapped book back onto the stone seat by the fireplace. “Doesn’t matter if the girl loves back. Doesn’t change how much it burns.”

Angel’s nose suddenly twitches, and he rises to his feet, head turning to face the door.

“She’s coming. She said she’d be here after training.”

“She comes to you at night, eh?” Spike asks with a skeptical tilt of his brows, trying to recapture his formerly jubilant and snarky attitude. “Sure that’s not a recipe for an accidental bit of hanky-panky?”

“Leave, Spike. Now.”

Spike rolls his eyes with another chuckle. “Gonna do somethin’ _private_?”

“For God’s sake, would you just leave us alone for her _birthday_ , Spike? If there’s any human decency left in you...”

“Don’t give me any blather about human decency, Angel,” Spike huffs. “I’m not the one who can’t act like a half-decent human without two hundred years of remorse on my back.”

“Please, Spike.”

Spike’s blue eyes meet the opaque ones of his former leader, the demon who made him a monster.

“Yeah. I’ll go.”

Straightening his duster that had gotten slightly off-kilter during their one-sided fight, Spike stomps toward the back door as Angel stands a little straighter and brushes dust from his shoulders.

“You’ll hurt her, Angel,” the platinum-haired vampire mutters loudly as he reaches the back door. “Even if Angelus doesn’t resurface, you’re still puttin’ her in danger. Sooner or later, one or both of you’ll realize you can’t take the gridlock anymore... and then you’re back to the ol’ square one: leave, or give in. But the monster you’d become isn’t that much worse than the monster you are now, leadin’ on a girl you can never love unconditionally.”

_Like I could_...

Turning his back on Angel before he can watch his own words sink in, Spike slips out the door and shoves it shut behind him with a groaning of hinges. He sniffs the air, then slowly leans back against the wall of the mansion and closes his eyes, filling his lungs and mind with the Slayer...

* * *

In the basement of the dilapidated bed-and-breakfast, the Sunnydale Arms, a scream vicious enough to wake the dead shakes a bleary-eyed young Watcher from his cot. Brow already coated in sweat, Blair shoots a glance at the other English guard, who shakes his head adamantly.

“It’s your shift,” Hobson mutters, already tugging a threadbare blanket over himself and keeling over on his own lumpy mattress.

Blair complies, closing the door and hurrying down the hallway to the foyer with its bricked-up windows and the rattling sarcophagus-sized crate. Fingers fumbling, he unlatches the sets of locks on the crate and opens the panel, revealing the straight-jacketed vampire.

“Pills!” screams Kralik, bug-eyed and snarling.

“Yes,” stutters Blair. He snatches up the empty glass and rushes over to the kitchen sink. “It’s coming!” he calls over his shoulder as the vampire continues screaming.

“Pills!”

Rushing back over, Blair sets the glass on the table and places two of the hemoglobin and drug-concentrate pills in the cup of the spoon, then holds it up to the frantic demon’s face, keeping his feet as far back as he can.

“Pills!” demands Kralik again, eyes squinted shut.

“Take them. They’re right in front of you.”

“Where?” The demon sniffs the air frenetically, then prods the end of the spoon with his flicking tongue. “I can’t see... can’t... can’t reach it...”

His own sweat running down and blurring his vision, Blair edges his foot slightly nearer to the crate.

“Open your ey–”

He gags, windpipe crushed in the vampire’s inexplicably free hand. Gasping and flailing as the demon lifts him off the ground, Blair drops the spoon and grapples desperately at the bone-white fingers around his throat. The last thing he hears is a comforting, slightly amused voice.

“Shh... Everything’s okay now...”

And then fangs sink deep into his neck, draining Blair of his blood and his soul...

* * *

Spike tenses as he hears the front door open, even on the opposite exterior side of the Crawford Street mansion. He remains immobile while Angel’s voice welcomes Buffy inside. The door swings shut with an ominous _thud_ , and only then does he turn around and angrily kick the wall beside the back door.

_She’s inside... she’s alone with him... and what if I just provoked the wanker into ballsin’ things up? If he hurts the Slayer now it’ll be my own soddin’ fault for eggin’ ‘im on!_

Dropping into a crouch, he slinks around the side of the building until he finds a trellis that looks strong enough to support his weight. He backs up a few paces, then hurls himself at the wall and leaps, catching the grate about seven feet up.

“Oh god!” Spike gasps, suddenly clenching his left arm into his chest as pain floods his nerves. He’d completely forgotten about the policeman’s shot to his shoulder, but the effort of repeatedly throwing Angel around the room is now repaying him with interest. The torn muscles that had started to heal – using the lifeblood of the cop and the two shots of blood he’d consumed at Willy’s – have split anew, and Spike feels the renewed bleeding into his t-shirt sleeve.

For a few moments, he just leans against the vertical grating, cursing and wincing, letting his demon face flicker to the surface in the hope that primal strength will fight the agony faster. When the pain subsides to a duller ache, he continues climbing one-handed until he reaches a window that’s free of bars or boards.

Teeth still clenched in an effort to bite back the throbbing running up and down his arm, Spike cocks back his leather-clad elbow and swings it into the glass, shattering a corner of the pane. Fortunately, the sound is muffled by the heavy brocade curtain on the inside of the window. He kicks in a few larger pieces of glass until he creates a hole large enough to slip through, then he eases himself inside, detangles his legs from the curtain, and creeps forward, probing the air with vampire-heightened senses.

“Thank you. It’s beautiful,” says Buffy somewhere down in the main room.

“You really like it?” Angel whispers.

Rolling his eyes at the absolutely poncey tone in his grandsire’s voice, Spike drops to a crawl as he nears the staircase and peers over the edge of the balcony at the pair by the fireplace.

“Of course I do,” Buffy says, trying for more enthusiasm as she leafs through the book of poems. “It’s... sweet and thoughtful and... full of neat words to learn and say like ‘wilt’ and ‘henceforth’...”

“Then why’d you seem more excited last year when you got a severed arm in a box?” asks Angel, sounding slightly wounded.

Spike nearly falls over the railing from surprise. _How come she’s not showin’ interest in the poofter’s present... and what the bloody hell’s it have to do with the chunk of the Judge she pilfered from that bookwormish oaf, Dalton? She didn’t really fancy that, did she? Think it a gift from yours truly?_

“I’m sorry...” says Buffy in a disheartened voice, setting down the collection of poems. “It’s just... suddenly there’s this chance that my calling’s a wrong number and... it’s just freaking me out a little.”

“That’s understandable,” Angel replies in a tone that’s surely meant to be comforting but just sounds preoccupied with disappointment at how poorly received his present is.

Buffy shakes her head, taking a few steps away from him. Spike’s brows tilt as he watches her – the unease in her gait, the trembling hunch in her shoulders. Gone is the cocky, powerful Slayer, and in her place is a frightened, normal girl. Whatever Willy’d heard about Buffy being out of sorts must certainly be true, but Spike had never imagined it to be _this_ severe.

“Angel, what if I _have_ lost my power?”

“You lived a long time without it. You can do it again,” her companion shrugs.

Spike grits his teeth again, glaring down at Angel. _The girl’s scared witless and all you can say is ‘buck up and get used to it’? Think how_ you’d _fare, you sod. Strength, speed, keen senses, all gone with no tellin’ why? Bet my duster you wouldn’t last a day before snuffin’ it._

To Spike’s delight, Buffy seems to agree with his silent musings.

“But what if I _can’t_?” she demands of Angel, wringing her hands in agitation. “I’ve seen too much. I know what goes bump in the night. Not being able to fight it... What if I just hide under my bed, all scared and helpless? O-or, what if I just become _pathetic_ , hanging out at the Old Slayer’s Home, talking peoples’ ears off about my glory days? Showing them Mr. Pointy, the stake I had bronzed?”

Spike has to clap a hand over his mouth to stop from laughing aloud, still watching intently as Angel stands and approaches Buffy. She doesn’t seem to notice how he’s favoring his ribs slightly, or the hints of bruises on his cheek and jaw – too engrossed in her own troubles.

“Buffy, you could never be helpless or boring, even if you tried,” says Angel kindly.

Buffy leans against a table, her face suddenly full of shame as tiredness and distress overwhelm her.

“Don’t be so sure. Before I was the Slayer, I was... well, I don’t want to say _shallow_ , but... okay, I’ll say shallow. Even _Cordelia_ looked like a classical philosopher next to me. Angel, if I’m not the Slayer, what do I do? What do I have to offer? Why would you like me?”

“I saw you _before_ you became the Slayer,” Angel murmurs.

_Broody stalkin’ git!_ Spike snarls inside his head, and Buffy squints, taken aback.

“You what?”

“I watched you, and I saw you called,” Angel continues, smiling at the memory. “It was a bright afternoon out in front of your school. You walked down the steps an–”

“Wait, wait, wait... _Hemery_? My LA school?” interrupts Buffy, crossing her arms and – for the first time that evening – looking a bit like her typical empowered self.

“Yes...” replies Angel, slowly and guiltily.

“How did you even find out about me, especially _before_ all the vampire deaths and burned-down gyms clued anyone in?”

Pleased to watch his grandsire getting interrogated so uncomfortably, Spike adjusts his eavesdropping position on the balcony, counting on the dark of the upper level to keep his platinum blond hair concealed from the tense ex-lovers.

“Whistler directed me to you,” Angel tries to explain. “You know The Powers That Be give him visions. They wanted me to be their champion, so they sent Whistler to me... so that I would go to you, and you would be my savior. They knew I would love you.”

“The same Whistler guy who showed up when you were all de-souled and said, ‘Oops, sorry I screwed everything up by bringing you and Angel together’?” Buffy demands harshly. “And what do you mean ‘they knew you would love me’? Wasn’t that the recipe for the soul-vanishing disaster that already put us all through hell, some _literally?”_

“Buffy...”

“S-so these... these so-called Powers manipulated my life by sending you into it? _They’re_ the reason Jenny Calendar is dead?”

“Buffy, please...”

“I’m not your _savior!_ All I did was make you lose your soul!”

“Buffy, calm down. You’re upset because of this little problem with your powers.”

She stills instantly, as though his words are a tranquilizer dart.

“ _Little problem?”_ she repeats softly, eyes fixed on Angel. “I just realized the real problem here, Angel. I’m weak... and I’m helpless... and I’m alone in an abandoned mansion at night... with a vampire who openly admits he wants me enough that he might not care if it costs him his soul again.”

Now it’s his turn to step back and freeze in place, like she’s slapped him.

_This is better than Passions_ , Spike silently chuckles. _Little popcorn an’ I could charge an admission fee for this kind of entertainment._

“Buffy...” whispers Angel, “Buffy, that... I would never force myself on you.”

“Wouldn’t you? I shared that dream with you, Angel. I know what you saw, what you wanted to do. You even _said_ it. You wanted to lose your soul in me and become a monster again.”

She paces, momentarily turning her back on Angel but then thinking the better of it and facing him again. Her hands shake visibly, and even in his amusement Spike’s muscles coil, ready to spring down the stairs and separate Angel from the girl if he makes any move towards her.

“Buffy, I thought we were past that,” the older vampire murmurs, forehead creasing with its typical brood lines.

“Yeah, we were past the part where you were gonna commit sun-icide if you didn’t get me _in bed_ , but aside from that, I’m really not sure _where_ we are.”

He winces at her retort, and Buffy picks up her red fleece coat from the couch.

“You know what, it’s late,” she mutters in a voice as shaky as her hands. “I’m sure my mom’s worried about me, and... I really don’t think it’s good for me to be around you right now.”

“You don’t trust me?”

Buffy looks up into his eyes... and remembers the murky brown shifting into terrifying gold.

“No. N-not... not right now. I need to think. I need time.”

“Buffy, at least let me walk you home.”

“No!” she shoots down his offer, shoving her arms into her coat sleeves. “I don’t need you. I’m fine.”

Before Angel can do anything but call out “Buffy!” one more time, she heads for the front door, lifts the latch, and vanishes into the night.

Immediately, Spike slinks back through the deserted second floor of the mansion to the broken window and maneuvers outside through the half-empty pane. One sniff, and he catches the aroma of her personal perfume on the air. Whatever’s affecting the girl, it hasn’t altered whatever blend of intoxicating pheromones make up her distinct Slayer scent.

Climbing silently down the trellis, Spike hops to the ground, swears once at the pain in his shoulder, and then rockets down Crawford Street in pursuit of his third Slayer.

_To be continued..._


	4. New Rules

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kralik causes mayhem. Buffy leaves Angel and encounters Spike.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Apologies for the delay in posting this week. I was at a work conference. Should be back to the usual schedule next week.  
> Chapter Notes: I imagine Kralik to be humming the ‘Darth Vader’ theme, LOL. Lyrics from "Take It All Away", by RED. Flashbacks/memories are in italics and past tense. POV shifts around as well.

Chapter 4: New Rules

“ _Hmm-hmm-hm-hmm_... _Hmm-hm-hmm, hmm-hm-hmm..._ ”

Kralik’s low, droning hums rouse Blair from his brief sleep of death. The young Watcher-turned-vampire opens sunken yellow eyes and rises from the floor, taking in his surroundings with awakened acute senses. His gaze finds his sire still bound in the straight-jacket inside the coffin-like box, and Kralik licks the last of Blair’s human blood from the fingertips of his free hand.

“Ah, you’re up,” he nods carelessly. “I was afraid I drained you too much. I do that sometimes. Ever have a tune you just can’t get outta your head? It just keeps playing over and over and over. Drives me nuts.”

Moving mechanically, Blair lifts the emergency ax from the floor and cuts through the thick leather strap binding Kralik’s head inside the crate. The mad vampire steps forward and pries the rest of the straight-jacket off of his body, stretching and grinning wickedly.

“Ahh. Thank you. That’s much better.”

Snatching up the pill bottle, he pops half a dozen of the hemoglobin supplements into his mouth and swallows them down with lip-smacking gulps of water.

“It’s a game, you know,” he shrugs to his newly-risen acolyte. “We’re not gonna play by their rules, but... that doesn’t mean we’re not gonna play.”

Finishing off the water, Kralik cracks his neck menacingly and jerks his thumb at the Watchers' sleeping quarters.

“Why don’t you call your friend in and... we’ll discuss it over dinner?”

* * *

Buffy’s eyes don’t fill with tears until she’s several blocks away from the mansion. _I just broke up with Angel... Did I? I think I did. Didn’t even bother to take the present he gave me. Well... fine! I deserve a life with a normal guy who could actually love me. Oh, who am I kidding?! Who’d ever want to date She Who Hangs Out a Lot in Cemeteries_?

She hugs her coat tighter around her, cringes as a car’s headlights swing in front of her, and then crosses the street, shoulders hunching. Forty feet behind her, Spike quickens his pace as he spies two hefty construction workers idling beside a parked truck directly in Buffy’s path. They whistle as she passes, and their eyes lewdly rove her slight frame.

“Hey sweet girl!” the drunker of the two calls out at her back, when she’s no more than a yard or two past them. Her feet suddenly freeze in place at the sound of the slurring voice. “How much for a lap dance for me and my buddy?”

Spike snarls just out of earshot, the blood boiling in his veins. His vampire visage shoves aside his handsome features so spontaneously that it seems like the demon within him has sprung free of his body. His legs tense up, resisting the urge to charge at the cat-callers and let his bloodlust run wild, rip them to shreds...

“ _Slayer, what’re you doin’_?” he whispers to himself, watching anxiously as Buffy starts to turn around to face the two workers. _Nothin’ you can do to the tossers in your state, pet. Dammit, if they lay their paws on you, I swear to God..._

Unaware of her defender, Buffy thinks better of making any response to the two thick-set men and just continues walking toward the alley shortcut she usually takes to get back to her house from the Crawford Street mansion.

“Buffy, let me walk you home,” she mutters in a self-depreciating tone, repeating her earlier refusal of Angel’s company. “No, I don’t need you. I’m fine...”

Spike licks the point of an elongated fang inside his mouth, raring for blood as the workers continue chuckling lecherously at the blonde’s retreating back. Once the darkness conceals her, the second worker nudges his buddy.

“Let’s get her.”

They step away from the pickup, heading after Buffy.

“I’d pause an’ reflect a moment if I were you, mate,” Spike growls out, his pronounced teeth heightening his Cockney dialect.

The two burly men wheel around, completely unaware until that moment of the vampire’s presence only a few swift steps behind them. With the nearest streetlight at his back, Spike’s distorted face is momentarily hidden, and all they can make out is his average height, dark leather coat, and bleached hair.

“Who are you?” the heavier drinker demands, squinting at Spike’s silhouette.

Spike chuckles, guttural and threatening. “Maybe I’m ‘er guardian angel. Maybe I’m your worst nightmare come to life. Maybe I’m just a bloodsucker wantin’ a midnight snack.”

He steps forward into the light of the next street lamp, and both of the large men quail at the sight of him – demonic ridges in his ivory forehead, yellow eyes glinting, massive sharp teeth filling his mouth.

“You... pathetic... wankers, makin’ a pass at a poor ‘elpless girl like that,” he snarls, stalking even closer.

“H-hey, buddy, we d-didn’t, I mean we weren’t gonna...”

Spike lets out a tiger-like roar, and the first blubbering drunk trips backwards on the curb, falling on his overall-clad buttocks. His coworker grabs a sizable flashlight out of the back of the pickup and holds it out at the vampire like a weapon. Spike just smirks, his usual crooked smile warped into a terrifying grimace.

“ ‘Fraid of the dark, mate?”

Grinning, he lashes out with one quick punch and sends the flashlight flying out into the middle of the street, smashing on impact with the pavement. Before the worker can even cry out, pale hands clamp onto his shoulders and fangs pierce deep in his jugular. Spike spills as much as he can manage, only swallowing a few sips before letting the bleeding, whimpering man sink to the ground. He kicks the bitten worker and then steps over him and bears down on the one who tripped, the lout who dared to ask the Slayer for a lap dance.

“I’m gonna kill you both,” Spike whispers, crimson splatters coating his mouth, chin, and neck. “You threatened my girl... an’ now I’m gonna make you scream as I drain you dry...”

“HELP ME! SOMEBODY PLEASE!”

Spike’s head whips up, Buffy’s panicked voice cutting through everything else in his brain. Abandoning his prey, he sprints down the alley where she’d disappeared only moments ago, his face shifting back to human form as he rounds the corner.

“HELP ME! PLEASE! SOMEBODY!”

The fear in her voice slices through him like blades made of fire. He leaps over a trashcan and between two tightly-spaced parked cars, then races to the end of the building into another alley, blockaded by a ten-foot chain-link fence.

Just as he registers the barricade, a screaming whirl of white and blonde rushes past him and nearly smacks into the fence.

“Slayer!” Spike shouts. “What’s after you?!”

Buffy turns back toward him, her mouth agape at the realization of exactly _who_ has her trapped against a wall she’s too weak to climb. Their eyes rove each other for a split-second. Spike’s expression softens as he takes in the terror in her face, her small cuts and bruises, her pretty pearl-sheen blouse, and the absence of her fleece coat. Buffy’s gaze is fixated on the blood coating most of Spike’s front.

“Spike?! Oh! Oh my god!”

He grins. “Hello, cutie. Surprised to see me again so soon, I’d wager?”

To his utter astonishment, Buffy’s eyes brim over with huge tears as she backs up into the chain-link fence, raising her hands with the palms toward him.

“Please don’t kill me! Please! Spike, I don’t want to die! Please!”

His smile falters immediately. The overwhelmingly pitiful tone of her fearful voice quells any possible doubts he might have had about her sudden absence of powers. She’s as harmless and helpless as any other hundred-pound girl – probably even _more_ so, since she’s grown accustomed to her calling-enhanced strength.

“Are you daft? Not gonna kill you, silly bint!” he replies. _Gotta uphold the image, keep her thinkin’ I’m still the Big Bad, all tough and crude so she won’t know how mad I am for her..._ “What’ve you done now, Slayer, pissed off a Suvolte or somethin’?”

“Spike, look out! Behind you!”

He spins around with a whirl of leather just in time to see a growling, feral vampire launch himself at Buffy. The girl screams and curls into a heap at the base of the fence, but Spike grabs the shirt collar of the fledge and yanks him backwards before his grasping hands can seize her.

“Back off!” he growls at the unfamiliar vampire, positioning himself between it and the weak Slayer.

His adversary just snarls and snaps its jaws at the both of them, as though it hasn’t yet remembered how to communicate through human speech. Its clawing hands slash out, nails gouging Spike’s cheek as he holds it at bay.

“Ow! Get off me, oaf!”

“Spike!” Buffy screams, still cowering behind him. “Spike, the other one!”

At the far end of the alley, an amused-looking vampire in a teal jumpsuit slowly approaches them, humming darkly. A few more steps, and the two vamps will have them cornered, and if they peel him away from Buffy...

Spike kicks out hard, driving the heel of his boot into the shin of the nearer vampire with a resounding _crack!_ It yowls and drops to the ground, clutching its own leg, and Spike lays into its face with a hook and uppercut, punching it another yard or so away before he turns to Buffy.

“Slayer! Arms ‘round my neck! Now!”

She stares at him in bewilderment, still shaking and cringing with her back to the fence.

“Gotta scale it!” Spike shouts into her face, shooting a quick glance at the idly humming second vampire, drawing ever nearer. “Only way! C’mon!”

He grabs at her arm, and she shrieks with fear and pain.

“No! Don’t hurt me! Spike, please!”

“Take it easy!” he barks, torn between softening his voice to try to alleviate her terror while still pressing the urgency of their nearly-trapped predicament. “I can get us over! Gotta trust me, Slayer! Just lock your wrists ‘round my neck, c’mon.”

She gives a scared glance at the approaching jumpsuit vampire – _Better the enemy you know..._ – and latches her arms over Spike’s shoulders, piggy-back. He winces once when her fingers dig into his bullet injury, but then lunges the remaining two steps toward the chain-link fence and starts clambering up.

“SPIKE!”

Buffy’s scream turns his guts inside-out an instant before he feels her yanked downwards, the feral vampire gripping her ankle, trying to pull her off, her fingers slipping on Spike’s blood-soaked skin.

“Hold on!”

“It’s got me!” she cries, clinging to him, her tear-streaked cheek against the back of his neck. “Spike!”

Hooking his fingers through bits of the chain-link, he thrusts his boot into the vamp’s face with a forceful grunt. Nearly concussed, the monster loses its grasp on Buffy and falls back down to the alley pavement at the feet of the jumpsuit-wearing vamp.

“Hold tight!” Spike orders, nearly reaching the top. “OWW! Sod it!”

A thick coil of barbed wire lines the uppermost edge of the fence, the points piercing and ripping his palms and fingers. He lets out a string of swear words as he pulls himself over the top, Buffy on his back. From there he drops straight to the ground on the other side, glares quickly through the fence at the humming vampire, and tugs on Buffy’s arms.

“Let go now, pet! C’mon, gotta run!”

“Can’t,” she whimpers, and all of a sudden she collapses in a heap on the sidewalk. On the opposite side of the fence, the two vampires grin, and the one who’d grabbed her ankle rises from the pavement and begins to climb.

“Slayer!” gasps Spike. “Buffy, get up! Dammit, Buffy!”

She’s gone into shock, her entire body twitching and unresponsive. Ignoring the stabbing ache in his shoulder, Spike winds one of his arms around her shoulders, threads the other under her knees, and heaves her up, hefting her against his chest.

“I gotcha, luv,” he grunts out, his cut-up hands spreading crimson stains on her white shirt. “Got a hiding spot in mind.”

He breaks into a sprint, trying to carry her as steadily as possible, and runs with her down another abandoned alley. Behind them, the humming ceases, and the feral shell that was Blair drops to the ground and stares at his sire for instructions.

“Interesting,” Kralik whispers, watching the Slayer of Slayers and the tiny girl in his arms disappear around the next street corner. “How very... interesting...”

* * *

  _You've stripped me down; the layers fall like rain._  
It's over now, just innocence and instinct still remain.  
You watched me while I slowly disappeared.  
I reached for you to save me; you were frozen in your fear  
Take it all away... Take it all away...

* * *

"Hobson? Blair?"

Quentin Travers eases open the door of the boardinghouse and enters the anteroom, brooding over his recent conversation with the current Slayer's Watcher. The nerve of the man! The laughable notion that bookish, squeamish Rupert Giles would know better than the Director of the Watcher's Council, daring to suggest that the time-honored rite of the Cruciamentum did not _apply_ to _his_ Slayer, than millennia of tradition could be ignored...

_"You're having doubts," he deduced from the sullen look on the middle-aged Watcher's face. Travers took a sip of tea and continued when Giles gave no reply. "Cruciamentum is not easy... for Slayer or Watcher, But it's been done this way for a dozen centuries, whenever a Slayer turns eighteen."_

_"It's an archaic exercise in cruelty," Rupert muttered bitterly. "To lock her in this... tomb... weakened, defenseless. And to unleash_ that _on her."_

_Both Watchers' heads turned almost reflexively toward the crate in the corner, Travers moving idly, Giles sickened by thoughts of the creature within._

_"If any one of the Council still had actual contact with a Slayer, they would see," he continued, his tea untouched in his hands. "But_ I'm _the one in the thick of it."_

_"Which is why you're not qualified to make this decision," Quentin countered, unperturbed. "You're too close."_

_"That's not true."_

_"A Slayer is not just physical prowess. She must have cunning, imagination, a confidence derived from self-reliance. And believe me, once this is all over, your Buffy will be stronger for it."_

_His only split-second hesitation in his entire blasé answer was in calling the Slayer 'your Buffy', a mild concession to appease the anxious younger man, allowing Giles to go on thinking he had some exclusive close connection to the Chosen One. The Slayer was not 'his', she was the Council's, a tool in the never-ending struggle against primordial evil._

_"Or she'll be dead for it," murmured Giles, meeting the gaze of the Director with something deep in his eyes, a feeling beyond fear. Fatherly love, that's what he felt for the girl..._

Increasingly galled as he remembers the details of their discussion, Quentin crosses the parlor of the Sunnydale Arms, his greatest concern at the moment the paperwork he'll have to file to have Giles dismissed as Buffy Summers' Watcher, and then to replace him with someone who will never sway from the Council's orders. Perhaps that enthusiastic lad of Roger's... yes, Wesley... Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, obsessed with answering the call of his superiors, a pleasant boy... but a sycophant, forever unable to meet his father's – and maybe his own – expectations. Yes, Wesley will do.

"Hobson?" Travers repeats, brusque and unfeeling. "Blair?"

He begins to climb the stairs, certain that he'll find both of the shiftless lads slumbering in their quarters. His hand trails along the banister... and suddenly encounters something wet and tacky. On the landing, Quentin lifts his fingers from the railing, turns over his palm, and freezes in place, transfixed by the sight of the fresh blood coating his skin.

The eerie silence finally draws his attention. Glancing quickly down into the sitting room, he stares through the darkness at the vampire's crate – the open padlocks and broken straps, the straight-jacket lying on the floor before it.

"Blair! Hobson!" Travers shouts, whipping a cloth out of the pocket of his tweed jacket and swiping at his hand to clear the surface of the gruesome red. He continues up the stairs, his forehead more clammy than he would ever have admitted.

Reaching the bedroom that served as the apprentice Watchers' quarters, he rapidly turns the knob and gropes the wall for the light switch. He finally finds the switch, and the room is flooded with a yellow glow that is instantly stained red. No amount of cold logic or composure could have prepared the Council Director for the sight before him – the grotesquely mauled remains of Hobson, blood splashes coating the walls from floor to ceiling.

Travers gasps and gags, holding his handkerchief to his mouth as he backs away from the room and flees back toward the stairs.

"Hey now, don't go..."

A smug, gravely voice intercepts him, and Quentin stops on the landing and lowers the cloth from his face as his eyes meet the golden ones of Zachary Kralik.

"Not so brave without your peons, Director Travers," says the vampire. He grazes one hand along the banister and then licks the blood from his fingertips, humming as he does so.

"Where's Blair?" demands Quentin, impressing himself with the steadiness of his own voice.

"He's mine now," Kralik replies lazily. The young Watcher appears behind Kralik's shoulder, his face the gruesome grin of a demon, growling at his former employer with no sign of recognition.

"My god..." Travers swallows hard. "This changes nothing. The Slayer will perform her duty."

"Ah, yes, the Slayer." Kralik slowly licks another bloodied finger. "The Chosen One... chosen to die. Didn't even have to dirty my hands with her, though I would have _loved_ to get a taste of that blood. Pretty little thing smelled so good, but _he_ got to her."

“H... he?” stammers Travers. “Are you insinuating someone other than yourself has–?”

“Such a long word. 'Insinuating'.” Kralick mounts the first step and draws nearer to the unarmed Council Director, his feral and grinning fledge right behind him. “I'll break it down for you, friend. Heard of William the Bloody? Well... I'd say right about now, he's fangs-deep in your helpless little Slayer.” His mouth curves licentiously. “Maybe balls-deep in her, too. I know I would be, if I was him. Nice thought... pretty little girl all dressed in white, all her strength stripped away, unable to fight back... unable to do anything but scream. Like you're about to.”

Quentin feels the wall behind his back as the two vampires approach, their eyes full of hunger and cruelty. If he spares any thoughts for Buffy Summers as the murderous monsters advance on him, it's only a brief consideration of how she's inconvenienced whomever will succeed him.

_Damn. Someone in the Council will have a dreadful lot of paperwork for this..._

* * *

_Am I kidnappin' her?_ Spike ponders as he carries the half-conscious Slayer through the dark streets of Sunnydale, heading by habit for the condemned, middle-of-nowhere factory. _Just for safekeepin', of course, not holdin' her ransom or anythin' of that sort... just protectin' her... Blimey, it'll be just my luck if this odd weakness of hers clears up right when I've got her alone. Reckon she'll sock me in the nose and run smilin' back to ol' Forehead._

Buffy hasn't said a word since he'd picked her up off the ground, only quivered with cold and shock, her hands and face hidden against his shoulder. As he reaches the factory and kicks in one of the ground-floor doors, Spike realizes that not once during the whole walk did he have even a thought of drinking from the girl. Her alluring Slayer scent is masked somewhat by the peach-shampoo smell of her hair – fruity and girly and innocent, a stark contrast to her usual vibe of pun-laced prowess. Most of what he can smell at the moment is his own blood, damp on his shoulder and still seeping from the half-scabbed barbed-wire cuts on his hands.

Crossing the large anteroom, where the cage that bore the Annoying One up to his blistery death still swings near the ceiling, Spike carries Buffy to the nearest staircase and down into the basement. He carefully avoids the hole in the stairs and the exposed rebar jutting out from the concrete, and then pauses when he reaches the bottom step, gazing around at the messy surroundings.

“Uh, reckon this spot is as good as any,” he shrugs. “Don't think those pillocks managed to follow us here. Buffy?”

The cessation of movement seems to jar her out of her frozen, shaking shock, but only barely. She looks around through water-logged eyes, still locked tight around Spike, her tiny balled fists clutching his shirt collar like it's a life preserver.

“Wh... where are w-w-we?”

“The Old Factory. Basement. Couldn't think of anywhere else to go...” _Aw, cripes._ _Should've gone back to your mum's place if I'd screwed my brain on straight. Idiot_. “Just figured no one'd look here for you.”

To his astonishment, she drops her head onto his shoulder again and starts weakly sobbing. Perplexed, Spike kneels to set her on the ground by the foot of the bed and awkwardly pats her back. Comfort has never been one of his strong suits; whenever Drusilla went into one of her babbling fits, all he could do was sit in a corner, drink some blood or booze, and wait for her pixies to stop yammering.

"Buffy? Uh... steady on, pet, there's a good girl. Easy does it..." _So much for being rough an' unfeelin'_. _Turnin' into a bleedin' wet nurse._

“You b-b-brought me here t-t-t-to kill m-me!”

“No!” he exclaims. “Got it all wrong, Slayer! Just helpin' scurry you away. Not gonna hurt a hair on your head, I swear.”

“B-b-but... but before Christmas, y-y-you... c-c-came back to...”

_That was before I came to my senses, or lost 'em, rather. Realized that the thought of Peaches hurtin' you made me want to peel off every soddin' inch of his flesh and burn it._

“Had a change of heart,” Spike murmurs honestly. “ 'Sides, no matter how much I hate it here in Sunnyhell, it's better than that hundred-an-eighty-percent humidity jungle where Dru and I shacked up. Also, no bloody howler monkeys here.”

He starts to pull away, but she grips his shirt in both hands so strongly that if she'd had her full strength she would have ripped it right off of his chest.

"N-no! Don't leave me! Spike!"

Hearing her scream out his name in such an utterly terrified voice – as if the handful of his cotton shirt in her grasp is the only thing keeping her sane – is like a knife twisting in his gut. _Poor lil' thing... so scared she doesn't know whether to run from me or hang on for dear life._

“Shh... shh, Buffy... it's a'right now...”

She buries her face in his chest, bawling, her whole body shaking uncontrollably. He enfolds her in his arms again, biting back tears of his own and talking in soothing whispers.

"Shh... Buffy, gotta calm down... you'll make yourself sick..."

"I'm g-gonna die. I don't want t-to die alone. Don't leave me!”

"Not gonna die. I'm not goin' anywhere, sweets. Was just gettin' you a blanket, stave off the shock. You can't keep shakin' like this, usin' up all your energy. Just let me get somethin' to wrap around you. I won't leave you, Buffy."

He gently pries her arms off his neck and, still kneeling beside her, wrests his duster off and tucks it around her. _Fitting_ , he ponders as she tentatively pulls the leather a bit tighter, her pretty pink nails looking so out of place against the black. _Slayer's coat on a Slayer again._

“That feel any better? Warmer?”

“S-smells like blood. Y-your shoulder," mumbles Buffy, noticing the sticky texture of his t-shirt.

"Got shot. Doesn't matter. What 'bout you?"

"I d-d-don't know... it hurts..."

"What hurts, luv? Gotta tell me."

She doesn't speak, so he inspects her, stroking her soft blonde tresses as her sobbing slowly quiets. There's heavy bruising on her right collarbone, between her tiny silver cross and the neckline of her layered white blouse, and also a bit of purple around her left eye, and she cradles her left arm like it's damaged.

"Lemme see your arm."

"No," she whimpers, wrapping the coat tighter around herself.

"Slayer, gotta check if you've wrenched somethin'."

Reluctantly, she stretches her left hand toward him, and he gently skims his fingers around each of hers in turn, then her wrist, then up her forearm to her elbow. Her shaking has not ceased, but her crying is now a mere sniffling. He shifts closer to her as his fingertips reach her shoulder, checking all her bones and muscles with extraordinary tenderness.

"Did I hurt you at all?" he murmurs. A skittish shake of her head is his only answer. “Well, nothin' seems wrong with you that I can suss out. Little brusin', scrapes on your knuckles. Who'd you punch, pet?”

"Th-there, there was th-th-that other one. Vampire. Heard humming. R-ran into him."

"That the one who took your coat?"

Her shell-shocked face twitches briefly with suspicion. "H-how did you know I had a coat?"

"Saw those human bilge rats checkin' you out not a minute before we crossed paths. I, um... may have slashed them up a bit."

Buffy glances at the additional smudges of blood remaining around his shirt neckline and in the crease between his jawline and throat. _Spike attacked them for cat-calling me? Or was he just hungry and found them at random? That must be it. He'd... he'd never stick up for me. More likely he'd join them in Pervert-ville._

"Well, y-yeah, the humming one t-t-took my coat."

"Think that must have been Kralik. Zachary Kralik, evil bastard, even for a vampire. Heard rumors down at Willy the Snitch's place, said some English types had brought him here. Well, don't worry your pretty head about him now, Slayer. Nothin's gonna hurt you here." _S'pecially not me_.

She stares at her own hand, still cradled in both of Spike's. “When I hit him it felt like my arm was broken. It hurt so much. I... I c-can't be just a person. I can't be helpless like this. Why is this happening to me?”

Spike shrugs his uninjured shoulder, softly gliding the pad of his thumb over her discolored knuckles, where the skin is split open in a few places.

“Pro'ly just some hex, or some demon spiked your milk. Reckon your Watcher and sidekicks'll work out what the trouble is, have you back to fightin' strength in no time.”

She doesn't seem to take any comfort from his words, just cringes into the warmth of his leather duster, flexing her sore hand. Spike eyes the little cuts, and, reflexively, his tongue flicks out to the edge of his lips, sampling her scent in the air.

“If... if you want, I could fix these for you, pet,” he murmurs, his thumb still tracing her knuckles.

“What?”

“I... well, I could... seal the cuts up.”

“Seal...?”

As slowly as he can, he lets his demon visage rise to the surface with a crunch of shifting bone. Her eyes go wide and brim with tears again, shivers coursing across her skin.

“You w-want my blood. Th-that's why you s-s-s-saved me.”

“No, it's not!” Spike insists, inwardly cursing his rashness. _Stupid blighter, makin' her think I want a snack_. “Not doin' it to get a taste of you! I said I wasn't gonna harm you, an' I mean that. Just thought I could patch you up a bit. Can't do a thing for the bruises, but could take care of these cuts in a half-second.”

He suddenly becomes aware that – despite her fear – she hasn't pulled her hand out of his, perhaps because she knows he could just yank it back if he truly wished to. _This_ is the girl who'd broken his back... and now she trembles at his every motion, seemingly waiting for him to turn on her and snap her neck.

“Look... this is all I'm gonna do.” Maintaining eye-contact with Buffy, he raises her knuckles to his lips and just barely flicks his tongue across the cracked skin on her index finger. She squints in slight surprise at how cooling and comforting the sensation feels, the first tiny cut looking significantly better than the rest of her fingers.

“That alright?” asks Spike cautiously, savoring the single drop of Slayer ambrosia... but also tasting the faintest hint of a bitter something mixed in with her blood, something that stings in his throat as he swallows. _She's... she's been poisoned!_

“I... yeah... I guess,” Buffy mumbles.

“Alright if I do the rest?”

“Okay.”

Holding her hand more assuredly now, he lowers his mouth and runs the tip of his tongue across the row of her knuckles, cleaning all the blood from the surface of her skin. Accidentally at first, he stops just licking and fully presses his lips to her injuries, softly caressing, his vampire face retracting without his notice. Despite the unnatural taint in her bloodstream, his own body revels at the power in those few precious drops, sealing his shoulder wound almost instantly... and the rest floods down into his groin. Painfully hard in mere moments, he lets out the slightest moan, head still bowed over her hand.

“Spike!”

Her voice – harsh, disgusted, and familiarly annoyed – crashes against his ears like a whip lash, and he suddenly realizes his healing strokes to her now completely healed fingers have devolved into unmistakable, _worshipful_ kisses. He drops her hand immediately and backs away, arms raised in a show of capitulation.

Unfortunately for him, there's Slayer spark back in her eyes.

_To be continued..._


	5. Truce

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: For the sake of the effects I want to have, the organic compounds that are weakening Buffy are bio-cumulative with a small time delay so that even though she's not being dosed anymore, the symptoms are still increasing.

Chapter 5: Truce

Green eyes stare hatefully into blue, then at her hand, and then back at him.

“What the hell were you doing?”

“I... well, I...” _Right, back to rough an' unfeelin' it is._ "Had to do somethin' to get you to stop cryin'. Figured pissin' you off was the way to do it."

He vamps again with a snarl – making her squeak and shrink back slightly – and licks the barbed-wire cuts on his own hands as exaggeratedly and grossly as possible, slathering his tongue over his palms.

“You are obscene,” grumbles Buffy, even as she tightens his duster around her still-shivering shoulders, hiding both her arms underneath the leather.

“Yeah, you're welcome, Slayer,” he retorts irritably, handsome face replacing the furrowed brow and sunken eyes, fangs retracting into gums. “Next time, you can climb your own bleedin' fence an’ I’ll stand back an’ watch.”

She scowls and sits a little straighter against the foot of the bed, trying to burrow deeper into his coat.

_Pale face and white shirt and that tuft of golden hair… poor little girl’s like a ruddy ghost. And there I go again, turnin' back into soddin' tender-hearted William_.

“Cold, Slayer?”

“No.”

“ 'No, not cold' or 'No, don't need help from the likes of demons’?”

“I don't want your help.”

“Funny,” he mutters, yanking a blanket off the bed and tossing it at her, “ 'cause I seem to recall a lot of _'Oh Spike, don't leave me, don't let me die alone!'_ Think I liked you better when you were all weepy and stutter-y.”

“Shut up.”

To Buffy's surprise, he does. Stomping a few feet away, Spike sifts through a pile of debris on the floor until he finds two ratty cloths to wind around his healing palms, his thoughts seething. _Soddin', barkin'-mad idiot! Sayin' “I liked you” right in front of 'er. Might as well hand the girl a broom handle and beg her to stake me. Hope to God whatever she's been shot up with has affected her hearin'._

“Why did you bring me here?” Buffy demands, her voice quieter and a pout on her lips as she assesses the dark factory basement.

“Told you a'ready. First place I thought of. Figured the vamps who attacked you wouldn't think to trace you back to this dive. Good spot to hide and let the...” he gestures vaguely at her and lights up a cigarette, taking care not to ignite the makeshift bandages, “ _whatever's_ wrong with you, blow over.”

"They'll know where you've taken me, Spike,” she says with narrowing eyes. She removes his coat, pushes it away across the floor, and bundles up in the blanket instead.

“Who? Kralik and his empty-headed lil' minion?”

“No. My friends.”

"Explain that to me, pet?" he grins. "No one in this whole bloody town 'cept Angel, that snitchin' weasel barkeep, and the vamps who nearly made mincemeat of you know that I'm back in Sunny-D."

Her eyes widen for a moment before she manages to assume an unconcerned face again. _Angel knows he’s here? Angel… he could trace him back to this place… if I hadn’t told him to stay away from me._ "W-well... when I don't show up for school tomorrow, Willow and Xander are going to flip."

Spike smirks, snatching up his coat and shoving his arms back into the sleeves, the leather now bearing the faintest traces of her alluring scent. _Mmm… Slayer musk…_ “Saturday, pet. No lessons on Saturday.”

“So, w-what, you're going to hold me hostage?” Buffy demands, barely keeping the fear from her voice. _He really could kill me, do anything he wants to me… and I don’t have the strength to stop him_. “What do you want, Spike? Money? Blood? Revenge?”

He rolls his eyes and turns away from her, taking a long draw on his cig. “Nice to know how you really think about me, pet.”

“Actually, I try not to think about you much at all,” she shrugs, smiling sarcastically. “But you _are_ holding me hostage.”

“No, I'm bloody-well not!” he growls, spinning to face her, barely keeping a lid on his temper or his mouth. “I'm _protectin'_ you, you silly bint! Saved your bleedin' life!”

“I... I don't want your protection,” says Buffy in a small voice, surprised by the fervor of his reaction.

“Not holdin’ you here ‘gainst your will,” he mutters, sounding surly and rejected. He indicates the damaged steps with the glowing tip of his cigarette. “There’s the stair if you really fancy leavin’, wanderin’ the streets alone. Go on. Watch the rebar on your way out.”

Buffy glances at the hazardous staircase, cluttered with trash and chunks of broken concrete, rusted steel protruding at odd angles. If she climbed that and left the factory… yes, she’d be free from Spike, but she has much more to fear now than just feral vampires. As the school bully and those cantankerous drunk workers had demonstrated, even humans can be dangerous. And right now she feels too weak to slay anything bigger than a fruit fly.

“You… you really don’t want to hurt me?” she asks, fixing Spike with a wary but curious stare.

“How’d you suss that bit of brilliance out, Slayer? Only took me sayin’ it three or four soddin’ times.”

“It… just doesn’t make sense. You hate my guts, and I hate your guts more. Why would you rescue me?”

He kicks the bedstead lightly with his steel-toed boot, eyes on the floor as his head tries to sort through his own bewildering actions and motives. _‘Cuz I can’t stop thinkin’ about you… tried my darnedest, but couldn’t… and Dru wouldn’t have anythin’ to do with me because she could tell I’m fixated on you. ‘Cuz I’ve always fallen for birds that are above me – Cecily, Drusilla, an’ now you, Slayer. An’ I knew I had to get you away from Angelus an’ his shaky soul before your pretty blood stained his lips. ‘Cuz I’ve always let my heart rule, not my brain. That’s the reason I didn’t change into a monster when the demon took up shop in my innards, didn’t change the man I am, just made me a little wilder. Still poncy William Pratt deep down, still a gentleman._

“Uh… hello?” prompts Buffy, watching Spike’s silent, contemplating form.

“I… just didn’t think you deserved it, bein’ hurt by those gutless sods, or by Kralik. Thought you’ve got the right to go out fightin’ full strength, like a proper Slayer. You’re the best opponent I’ve had in over twenty years, made my unlife a little less borin’. That’s all.”

Buffy raises an eyebrow.

“You’re a terrible liar, Spike. What else is it?”

“What’s the use in me sayin’ anythin’? Not gonna convince you,” he scoffs, half to himself. “Gonna think badly of me no matter what. Did it ever occur to you, Summers, that you don’t _know_ me? A few little battles, a single truce, an’ then a run-in over hot cocoa, and you think you _know_ me?”

“But you think you know _me_?” she counters.

“Made a reputation studyin’ an’ fightin’ Slayers, luv. I pro’ly know more ‘bout what you _are_ than you do.”

“So why am I sick, Mr. Slayer Expert? Why have I lost my powers?”

His mouth turns dry, and he swallows twice before answering. “Well, I… I could taste somethin’, somethin’ off in your blood. Don’t know squat about chemistry, just know somethin’ there that shouldn’t be, a poison.”

“ _Poison?_ ” she repeats in a gasp. “I… I _am_ gonna die?”

“I dunno!” he shouts back, internally smacking himself. “Just said I don’t know _what_ it is, just a slight unnatural taste. Makin’ yourself crazy worryin’ over it won’t help. Guess the best you can do is wait it out.”

“Or I should go to the _hospital_ , you idiot!”

“An’ tell ‘em what? ‘ _Evenin’ Doc, I’m a superhero who’s lost my powers on account of some potion or other, an’ now I’m a normal little girl. Fix me up so I can return to my sacred duty of slayin’ vampires and demons’_? Flawless plan, Slayer. Bloody brilliant. Up you get. Let’s go.”

She scowls, considering the alternative and almost instantly condemning her own suggestion. _I hate hospitals… and he’s right. For a normal girl, I’m fine. Doctors wouldn’t find anything wrong with me… and if I hinted at the real problem, they’d probably ship me off to a nuthouse like my parents did._

“No,” answers Buffy, her voice steely. “I’ll… I’ll wait it out.”

“A’right then. So… let’s get a couple things straight. I’m not gonna hurt you, ‘nless you piss me off royally, and then you’d deserve it. So you can stop lookin’ at me like you’re waitin’ for me to morph into a snarlin’ beast, a’right?”

“Okay.”

“Truce, Slayer?”

“Yeah. Yeah, truce. Just stay over there and be quiet. And don’t waft your stupid smoke anywhere near me,” she grumbles, tightening the ratty blanket around her torso.

“Fine by me.”

* * *

 “Oh, I’m sorry… what was that, Director?” Kralik sneers into the human’s mangled face. “My hearing just isn’t what it used to be. So many little girls screaming inside my head.”

“I… want… my phone call.”

“What’s that?”

“Phone… call.”

“Phone call?” Kralik snorts, glancing at Blair. “Do we give phone calls?”

Blair isn’t lucid enough to reply, just grimaces at his leader with a twisted smile and licks some of Travers’s spilled blood from a fingertip.

“Eh, I suppose I’m a reasonable vampire,” grins Kralik, loosening Travers from the confines of the box and shoving the elderly man to the ground. “Off to the parlor, there’s a good boy. Two minutes… and then we kill you.”

Bones grating, bleeding everywhere, Quentin crawls into the sitting room of the Sunnydale Arms and gropes for the telephone. With shaking fingers he dials the international number, directs to London then to the Watcher’s Council, and holds the receiver to his ear.

“Council Headquarters.”

“Nigel,” coughs Quentin, recognizing the voice immediately. “It’s… Travers. Code Rong-Wood. Get… Roger. Quick, man.”

“Yes, sir, of course, sir,” Nigel splutters, and then Travers hears the sound of the line transferring to Occult Archives, the branch managed by Wyndam-Pryce and his son. Behind him, Quentin hears a dark chuckle and the droning hum of the deranged vampire, and a shudder runs through his weakening limbs.

“Archives, Wyndam-Pryce.”

“Roger… Roger, listen…”

“My god, Quentin, is that you?”

“Don’t… have much time. You are... Director now, Roger. Do you understand?”

“I… yes, but…” splutters the promoted Watcher, but Quentin’s hoarse voice cuts him off.

“And… your... your s-son.”

“Wesley?”

“He... was to be... her Watcher... Summers...”

“To replace Rupert Giles as Buffy Summer's Watcher?” Roger clarifies.

“Y-yes... but... too late... Will... William... the Bloody... killed...”

“Code Rong-Wood. So Miss Summers is dead?”

“Ye... yes... b-but... Wesley... Watcher... Miss Lehane...”

“I understand, Quentin. My boy will assume the role of Watcher for Faith Lehane. We will fly to Sunnydale at once, assess the… the damage.”

“Good, man. Must… must stop Kra– ”

“Sorry, old man,” says a guttural voice in Travers’s other ear, and he feels the phone being ripped away and crunched in a supernatural fist. “Time’s up.

* * *

 “Stop that!”

“I didn’t say anythin’, Slayer.”

“But I can hear you grumbling or growling or whatever freaky vamp thing you’re doing.”

“It’s not me, pet. It’s your stomach churnin’,” Spike mutters churlishly, almost gnawing through the butt of another cigarette. _Why did I have to fall madly in love with the annoyin’ little bint who hates me enough to use my guts for garters?_

“It is _so_ not my –”

The not-so-little grumble announces its presence again, and Spike chuckles at the petulant scowl on Buffy’s face. She hikes her knees closer to her chest, still refusing to stand up and even attempt to find a more comfortable spot in the room.

“I… I s’pose I could fetch you somethin’ to slake that…” _Easy now, mate, don’t be a bootlickin’ poofter…_ “I-I mean, anythin’s better than havin’ to hear your innards howlin’ like a black abyss. There’s a gas station ‘bout a block up Seventeenth Avenue. I could –”

“No!” gasps Buffy, so sharply that at first Spike suspects the sound is a sudden onslaught of hiccups.

“Come again, pet?”

“I… no. Don’t… don’t go anywhere. The last thing I need is for you to lock me down here and let me starve to death like you were gonna do to Willow and Xander.”

Spike clamps his jaw shut tight, rival emotions jockeying to force words out of his mouth. _There she goes again, s’pectin’ I’m just lookin’ for a chance to hurt her. But she doesn’t want me to leave her, guess that’s somethin’. Not like she has swell options: bein’ alone in the dark with a vampire she wouldn’t trust with a ten foot stake, or bein’ alone in the dark with nothin’ but the fear of whatever drug has weaseled its way into her system._

“Suit yourself,” he shrugs, dropping his cigarette to the concrete floor and mashing the butt beneath the sole of his boot. “Bound to get mighty stir-crazy in here, though, with your gullet all empty. You the kind of girl that gets bitchy when she’s hungry?”

If looks could stake, he’d be nothing but a pile of romantically frustrated ash at that moment.

“Check,” Spike smirks. “One hungry an’ bitchy Slayer.”

“Shut up,” Buffy gripes, finally agitated enough to move. She rises all the way to her feet and takes one step forward before crumpling back down with a sharp whimper that shreds into Spike like buckshot.

“Buffy!”

He crosses the room in two strides, drops to his knees at her side, and gently touches her blanket-shrouded shoulder. “Luv, are you hurt?”

“No,” she mutters resentfully, teeth tightly clenched. _I’m just empty… no powers, no energy, and no one here whose help I’d accept_. “I mean, yeah, but not _hurt_ -hurt. Sore from running and then sitting all crunched up for the last half hour.”

“I’m sorry. I would’ve moved you ‘till you were more comfy if you’d said anythin’.”

Taken aback by the sudden softness in his voice, Buffy glances up and only then realizes how very _very_ close his face is. Her eyes jump from feature to feature like a microscope switching focus – deep blue eyes, the white Y-shaped scar through his eyebrow, razor-sharp cheekbones, his glossy eyes again, rimmed by long black lashes. And his lips… faintly tinted pink, barely open, moist and full and…

_Oh my freaking gosh! I’m ogling Spike’s lips! And… is he bending CLOSER?!_

She shies away from him and thumps her head on the bed’s footboard.

“Ow!”

“Aw, pet,” he whispers sweetly, “what’ve you done to yourself?”

“Stop calling me all these stupid British names!” she snaps, holding her head. “You’re such an asinine freak! ‘Pet’. ‘Love’. Eww. Not sure which one is worse.”

He stands and turns away so she can’t see the wince cut across his face, so he can urge a growl into his voice and make it seem like anger. _Doin’ every soddin’ thing I can think of for her… and she treats me like an ant under her heel._

“Fine, _Buffy_. Would you like to sit somewhere else, _Buffy_?” he asks, pointedly over-enunciating her name.

_Whoa… take-it-personal-guy, much_ …

“Just… help me up,” she orders. Spike lets out a long deep rumble in his throat.

“Help you? Thought you didn’t _want_ any help from a creature of the night, fit for nothin’ but a sharp stab of the wooden variety. Thought acceptin’ help from me was _beneath you_.” _Like I’m beneath you… figuratively, anyway, since I’m standin’ an’ she’s on the floor._

“Well, my legs hurt, and I’m sick of squatting here, but I guess if you’re going to pout instead of help me, I’ll do it myself.”

He steps close to her again just as she sits up straight, and she expects him to roughly haul her to her feet and deposit her on the bed… and maybe that wouldn’t be enough for him. Maybe he would join her, violently – _heck, it’s not like I could stop him… oh god, I couldn’t stop him, and nobody would hear me scream_. _Oh god_ …

But what she _doesn’t_ expect is for him to tenderly reach across her back, secure his hands underneath both her elbows, and hoist her up slowly, letting her rest as much of her weight on his lean body as she wants.

“Where to, _Buffy_?”

_How did he manage to make my actual name sound like a pet name? Must be the stupid accent._

“Not a lot of options,” she shrugs, realizing too late that because of how he’s supporting her, the indifferent raise of her shoulders causes her to rub her entire upper back against his chest, the blanket slipping as she stands.

“Leave the blanket, lu– sorry, _Buffy_. I’ll give it back to you once you’re all situated. Would you like to sit on the bed there?”

“Yeah, that’s fine, but would you just stop saying my name like that?”

“Like how, _Buffy_?” he smirks slightly as he guides her around to the side of the bed and raises her just the height she needs to perch on the rumpled mattress and tattered blankets

“Like how you keep saying it,” she grumbles, shuddering slightly at the sight of all the caked blood on her white blouse, now that the blanket is removed. _His blood… he shredded his hands trying to save me… in what silly, messed-up universe does_ Spike _end up the one who saves me?_ “Just don’t talk to me at all. Better yet, stand _way over there_ where I can’t see you.”

She waves a hand at the corner of the dark basement opposite to the ladder, slightly fearing if she points him towards the stairs, he might take it as his cue to leave. As much as she’d point-blank deny it if he asks her, she doesn’t want him to just abandon her, at least not until morning, when she can find her way home.

“Right,” he scoffs, snatching the blanket up from the floor and handing it to her. “So you want me here, but don’t want to _know_ that I’m here?”

“Pretty much.”

“Figured that ‘bout summed it up,” he mutters. He watches her wrap herself in the blanket while he lights another cigarette, the glowing tip adding just the faintest illumination to the otherwise shaded basement. The scratches in his cheek – courtesy of the feral vampire minion’s claws – itch irritably, and he scratches idly at them, sighing.

“What?” Buffy instantly demands.

“Buffy, I didn’t say _anything_. Could you give me a soddin’ break here, please?” he asks, feeling tired, exasperated, and thoroughly maltreated in reward for his thrilling heroics. “I’m doin’ my ruddy best here, an’ you’re gripin’ my ears off. I save your life, give you shelter, offer to fetch food… what else do I have to do to play nice? Foot-massage?”

“If you touch my feet, I swear I will stake you,” glowers Buffy, tucking her shoes under another layer of covers, ignoring the musty smell emanating from them. _I doubt anybody’s been here since he kidnapped Xander and Willow and hid them down here_.

“Fine, nix the foot-massage.” _Hmm, mighty defensive, are we? Pro’ly just sussed out a ticklish spot._ “All I’m sayin’ is, I promised not to hurt you, an’ –”

“Yeah, like the promise of a vampire means much…”

“I gave my word,” he says, slowly and firmly, “and I’m no welcher, Buffy. I promised you wouldn’t be hurt, an’ I’m damn sure gonna stop anythin’ that tries.”

She closes her mouth tightly, quailing slightly at the intensity of his tone. It’s too dark to tell if the scowl on his face is one of determination, irritation, or bloodlust.

"So…” he finally continues, puffing on his cig, “the least you can do is be a bit more civil to a fella, a’right? No tellin’ what’s come over you or how long it’s gonna last, but whatever it is, I’ll be here watchin’ over you ‘till you can fight it on your own. So… let’s stop tryin’ to pour salt in each others’ wounds, eh? Plenty of other ways to pass the time…”

Knowing he’s probably being incredibly stupid and undermining any progress he might have just made, he gives her a long, lusty look – simpering lips and smoldering eyes – and trails one hand down his chest toward his belt. Buffy scowls with revulsion.

"Eww! Me and _you_?! That'd be like incest!"

Spike chokes, inhales half a lungful of cigarette smoke through his nose, chokes again, and sprays smoke rings all around his head, eyes watering. "It'd be _WHAT?_ "

"I'm Angel's girl." _Or I was until tonight, when I realized I was afraid of him, of what he could do to me..._ "You're his… vampire descendant or whatever you call it."

"The term is ‘childe’. He’s my grand-sire. I’m the dosser’s grand-childe."

"Yeah, that. If you... touched me, or did anything sick like you're acting like you would, it'd be like... like a son hitting on his dad's girlfriend."

"That's... ugh!" _Cripes, does she see me like that? Like I’m just the cast-off whelp of her stalker turned ex-snuggle-bunny-stalker? Oh, hell. Ohhhh, soddin’ hell, I’m doomed._

"You were the one making icky come-hither faces!" protests Buffy, slightly confused by Spike’s absolutely horrorstruck expression as he paces by the foot of the bed.

"You're the one who thought of it! I’m not his bleedin’ kid! Blood relations among vampires don’t work like that, not soddin’ remotely! 'Sides, I've cut myself off from the whole Aurelius lot. Couldn't stand the sods. Any of 'em.”

“Is that code for 'Dru broke up with me again'?” she quips, smirking.

“Mind your mouth, little girl,” mutters Spike, more sullen than defensive. “I don't see Mr. Broody Block-of-Wood tryin' to protect _you_ in your... whatever's goin' on with you." _Good thing too. Maybe what I said to ‘im actually got through to his pea-brain, how much he could hurt her_.

"I told him I was fine.”

"'Cept a little short on the whole 'strength to fight the demons' bit."

"If Angel knew you were the one holding me hostage, he'd come find me and snap your neck." _And then I’d be right back where I was in the mansion: weak, helpless, and alone in an abandoned place at night with a vampire who wants me enough to risk losing his soul and destroying everyone I love. Crap_. _At least Spike’s just snarky… and surprisingly concerned about me._

"Nice to see your gratitude's improvin’,” he drawls, nudging some of the refuse around with his foot. “‘Stead of threatenin’ to off me yourself, you’ve delegated the unpleasant task to your former squeeze… Oh, look! Candles."

Losing his forced surliness at once, Spike sinks to one knee, rummages around, picks up the biggest three candles, and fishes out his lighter. He wipes a clear spot on the nearest flat surface – a dusty bureau beside the bed – and clicks his flame to life, leaving a tiny glowing flicker that brightens up the area around Buffy before he moves across to another piece of furniture.

“Are you sure those aren’t Willow’s magic candles from when you _kidnapped_ her?” asks Buffy, disguising her relief as the mood lighting transforms the dark basement.

“Don’t smell all herb-y. Plain ol’ wax variety, so far as I can tell.”

“I’m still mad at you about that, you know.”

“What?” he gapes, pausing in bafflement as he prepares to light the third candle. “You liked it _better_ all dark and spook-ridden? Buffy, I can’t keep up, how’m I s’posed to–?”

“No, the light is great. I meant Willow and Xander, and how putting them in an impending death situation made them make with the smoochies, and Cordelia got shish-kabobbed and hates Xander now, and Willow and Oz seem to have made up but I’m not sure. But it never would’ve happened if you hadn’t brought them here.”

“So it’s _my_ fault your two best mates, after years of knowin’ each other, suddenly decided they wanted to rub noses?” he inquires. “That your new mantra, Slayer? Somethin' goes wrong in your life, blame Spike? Awful ungrateful of you to be whingin' about me, don’t you thi–… Slayer?… Buffy?”

She ignores him, staring at her watch, the room finally bright enough to read its face in the candlelight.

"It's past midnight."

"So?" mutters Spike, holding up his lighter for yet another smoke.

"It's... my birthday."

* * *

 

_To be continued…_


	6. Midnight Snack

Chapter 6: Midnight Snack

Spike freezes, his cigarette unlit, silently watching her. _Girl saves the town every night, saves the bloody world on a regular basis… ought’a have one night a year to be surrounded by family and friends, enjoying her special day… ‘stead of bein’ holed up in a basement with a creature she loathes, no matter how differently he feels ‘bout her._

"I... er... Happy Birthday, Buffy," he finally murmurs, chagrinned by his previous brusqueness. "Do you... are you sure you don’t want me to go out right quick an' fetch you somethin'? Certain foods you like, somethin' to cheer you up a bit? I swear I’d come back so fast you’ll not even have time to miss me."

She looks up at him, her green eyes full of tiredness and a residual fear. _Don’t leave me…_

“No… but… thank you. For offering.”

Instead, he pats down his jacket pockets, checking for anything he could casually offer up as a present, but finds only his predictable lighter, switchblade, and the cigarettes and wallet of the policeman he’d killed after plowing his car through the Sunnydale welcome sign. Buffy eyes him, and when he notices her curious glance, he shrugs and scratches the back of his head.

“Uh, I… thought I might’ve had a deck of cards on me or somethin’ you could amuse yourself with, but ‘fraid not. Sorry, luv – Buffy. Sorry. I meant ‘Buffy’. Won’t use the little endearments if you hate ‘em so much. Not that they’re, uh, endearin’. I mean…”

“It doesn’t matter.”

Too tired to care what he calls her, Buffy rubs her forehead, trying to knead away the ache that’s been consistently building just over her left eyebrow.

“Does your eye hurt?”

“All of me hurts,” she replies, more of a sigh than a pout.

“Is there anythin’ I can do?” asks Spike softly. _There I go again, soundin’ all poncy._

_There he goes again, being all nice and sweet and very un-Spike-like._

“No,” she mumbles, burrowing her legs all the way underneath the covers and knotting up her hands in her lap. “I just want to get better.”

“If I knew what the chemical bugaboo was, I’d fix you up straightaway,” he says genuinely, biting back the closing “ _pet”_ that nearly leaves his lips, trying to keep her appeased.

“I just hate being weak like this. And my birthday’s gonna suck if I’m stuck here with you. I was gonna hang out with Willow, paint each others’ nails and do normal-girl stuff. We got Lunchables and everything.”

"Come again?" inquires Spike, pausing in the middle of yet another attempt to light a cig.

"Lunchables. You do know what those _are_ , right?"

"Yes, I ruddy well know what Lunchables are. Threw me for a loop, is all."

"Why?"

"Just didn’t peg the mighty Slayer as bein’ a fan of the most saline-pumped, sugary concoction that ever got approved as a child's meal. You’re… what, seventeen, thereabouts?”

“Eighteen.”

_Supposed to be important, supposed to be special, even if I’m still a long way from that driver’s license. It was supposed to be me and Dad… but then he bailed, and any back-up plans involving Angel got thrown out the window… and now I’m stuck with Spike. I shouldn’t feel safe. I should feel the complete opposite of safe… unsafe. Very unsafe. So why don’t I?_

“Eighteen? Really?”

Something nags at Spike from a back corner of his brain, some little piece of Slayer info he’d gleaned during his century of obsession…

“Is this some kind of shortness joke? ‘Cuz it’s not funny,” huffs Buffy, cutting off his train of thought.

“What? No… no, just… thinkin’ ‘bout som’mit. Eighteen, eh?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I was still human when I was eighteen. Barely remember it. Barely remember anythin’ from before I became a vampire. Little memories I have are… sort-of out’a focus, like I was wearin’ lenses thicker than your ol’ Watcher’s.”

“Giles isn’t _that_ old,” she mumbles, eyes drooping, chin coming to rest on her chest.

“Guess watchin’ over _you_ is makin’ him go grey early, eh?” grins Spike, dusting off a chair and setting it in the corner Buffy had indicated, even though the whole room is faintly lit now, preventing him from being completely invisible to her no matter where he sits. “But anyhow, what I do remember ‘bout bein’… wait… Watcher… eighteen… oh bollocks…”

The connection is so obvious that he wants to smack himself for not sussing it out sooner. Her eighteenth birthday… the mysterious weakness…

“Buffy, I’ve got it. Reckon I know what’s happenin’ to you,” he announces, standing again and stepping over to her. “Think it’s called Cruciamentum, Latin for torture. Callous practice. Turns out, your Watcher’s gone and…”

His mouth hangs open, the rest of his sentence silenced. Buffy Summers is sound asleep, half-upright against the pillows and the headboard, little uneasy breaths inflating and deflating her ribcage.

Hesitantly, Spike crosses the rest of the way to her side, supports her back with one arm, and slips one of the pillows out from behind her so she can recline in a flatter position. He tucks the blankets tighter around her and just gazes at her for a minute until he’s absolutely certain she’s dozing deeply.

Then, with an anxious swallow to buck up his courage, he bends over and – ever so gently – brushes his lips to the bruised skin above her left eye.

“Be back ‘fore you can miss me, luv. Off to get a nummy treat for my girl.”

Moving away from her on tiptoe, he heads for the stairs, ascends in three leather-swishing jumps, and charges out of the empty factory and into the night.

In mere minutes he reaches the small convenience store attached to Sunnydale’s most run-down gas station, conveniently the closest one to the factory. Turning up his collar, Spike pulls open the door and struts inside, keeping his chin tucked in the unlikely event that anyone in this out-of-the-way joint might recognize him. His astute eyes skirting the shelf contents like pinballs, he wanders the aisles under the cheap fluorescent lights. The large mirrors in the store’s upper corners ignore his presence, of course, so he helps himself to the first item on his mental list, slipping a bottle of aspirin into an inner pocket of his duster. The next aisle over, a couple Cliff bars and a package of beef jerky join the aspirin, and then Spike turns to face the refrigerated section at the back of the store.

“Lunchables… what the soddin’ hell ‘ave I gotten myself into?” he mutters, reading the names of the yellow cardboard packages. “An’ they’ve all got meat in ‘em… means I’ll ‘ave to keep ‘em cold if she doesn’t want ‘em right away. Best to let the poor girl sleep as long as she can.”

“Do you need any help, young man?”

He whips around at the gravely female voice – the slight jangling of the pill bottle in his pocket sounding suspiciously loud in his enhanced ears – and locks eyes with a petite woman who looks about as old as him, without the vampire agelessness. Her close-cropped silver hair makes her head somewhat emulate that of a bald eagle, and her dark beady eyes are obscured by thick glasses.

“Uh… no,” he shrugs. “Just, uh, gettin’ a lil’ somethin’ for my bird.”

“Late night cravings, hmm?” the elderly lady smiles, taking a few slightly tottering steps towards him and leaning on her walker. Spike draws back, wondering why the instinctive fear that most humans experience near demons like him is having no effect on her. “You’re a lucky boy, very lucky. How far along is she?”

Spike’s eyes widen, the little blood he’s consumed in the last day draining from his face.

“Uh, ‘s not like that. Er, my girl, that is…”

“I remember like it was yesterday,” the woman continues sentimentally. “When my oldest, Jim, was on the way, all I wanted to eat was pickled herring and buttermilk pancakes. Not at the same time, of course.”

“She’s a lil’ _sick_ , is all,” Spike blurts out, fight-or-flight instincts on red alert. “Not got a bun in the oven. In’t possible.” _‘Nless Slayer’s been gettin’ happy with someone other than Tall, Dark, an’ Forehead, which sounds more barkin’ mad the longer I think about it_.

“Oh, my mistake,” she smiles toothily. “My family has run this gas station for decades, and I must say you look an awful lot like the harried young husbands who rush in here at all hours of the night–”

“Missus works late shift,” he invents, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “I _am_ in a bit of a rush ‘ere.”

“Say no more,” gushes the old lady, attempting what appears to be a wink at Spike. “I’ll be down by the checkout, dear, in case you need help finding anything.”

She lifts her hand from her walker and pats his leather sleeve before shuffling away, humming along to the big-band music softly playing through the store’s audio system. Considerably more agitated now than he’d been when he’d entered, Spike opens the lightly pressurized fridge door and snatches up two boxes, then stomps toward the beverage aisle. He hooks a six-pack of water bottles under one arm, but then hesitates in front of the beer.

_Blast it! Now I’ve got to pay actual dosh for this rubbish. What if that dame decides to card me, havin’ a laugh? Oh, sod it all. If they try to stop me, I’ll just bite ‘em._

Extracting two drinks for himself, he carries his goods to the register and dumps the Lunchables, water, and beer down on the counter.

“Give me a packet of Marlboro Ice Blasts if you stock ‘em,” he orders the pimply teenage boy behind the register. “And a… a five-pound bag of ice, if it’s not too much trouble,” he adds in a stilted but softer tone, noticing the store’s matriarch creaking toward them, smiling at him in recognition.

“I.D.?” says the boy, methodically ringing up Spike’s purchases and setting everything in a brown grocery bag.

Spike scowls, fangs seeking release from his human gums, but he keeps them in check and just gruffly mutters, “I’m twenty-six.” _Give or take a hundred. I was buyin’ cigs an’ booze before you were born, squirt._ _Before even Grandmum here was born, more likely than not…_

“Store policy,” the kid mumbles, quailing slightly as he takes in Spike’s long leather coat, dyed platinum hair, and scarred eyebrow. “Under forty, gotta see your I.D., man.”

Glowering, Spike reaches into his inner duster pocket, attempting to keep the stolen aspirin bottle’s rattling to a minimum as he fishes out the dead policeman’s wallet. _Wonder if I can flash the license’s dates at this joker with my thumb over the picture… Cripes, why do I even bother? It’s been a’least a half hour by now, if Buffy’s woken –_

“Tim, let the nice young man buy his beer.”

The feathery-haired old woman joins her grandson at the register, beaming from him to Spike. The teenager shrugs, adds the ice bag and cigarettes to the total, and double-bags the items.

“That’ll be $17.31.”

Spike forks over a twenty from the cop’s wallet and draws the bag under one arm. “Ta, mate. Keep the cha–”

“Now, now, you can’t go without your money. Tim’s still in training, you see, so it’s very important he get practice,” the grandmother smiles. “Okay, Tim, he gave you twenty dollars, so you owe him how much?”

Spike stands there gritting his teeth while the kid counts back his two dollars, two quarters, dime, nickel, and four pennies in change, a string of oaths running through his head. _Takin’ so bloody long! Just give me my soddin’ quid an’ lemme get back to the girl I love before she wakes up alone and hates me more than she already does!_

“Much obliged, ducks,” he barks out the moment the last penny falls into his palm and practically flees from the gas station before the store’s matron has the chance to snag him with any other delays. He skirts the edges of buildings, letting the overhanging awnings conceal him from nearby street lamps, walking as quickly as possible without dropping the grocery bag.

Reentering the factory, he adjusts the contents of the bag so that the Lunchables boxes lie flat on the bottom surface, covered by the icepack, with the loose water bottles and his beers lining the sides.

“Oh, bollocks. Meant to nick some grease for this bloody door, too,” he exhales as he opens the basement door and the hinges creak ominously. He clicks the door locked behind him, slips back down the wrecked stairs, and lands on the floor with cat-like softness, his eyes instantly locking on the bed. A few frozen seconds later, a grin parts his lips.

“Right where I left you, sleepin’ beauty.”

Spike watches Buffy continue snoozing soundly, shivering a bit as she breathes, a pinched look on her face, as though she’s attempting to solve math problems in her sleep. He sets the paper bag by the foot of the bed, then steps silently around the room and blows out the two shorter candles. Leaving the tallest one flickering on the bedside bureau, he finds a cracked ceramic plate among the debris littering the floor and scoots the plate under the remaining candle so that even if it does burn down while they sleep, it won’t set fire to anything.

Their safety assured, Spike shrugs off his duster, places all its pockets’ contents in the top of the grocery bag, and drapes it over the bed, adding another layer of warmth over the dozing girl. His red silk overshirt follows suit, and he wads it up in his hands, grubbing at the left shoulder where his blood has dried in the fabric. Then, for a long moment, he stands there beside her, body and mind and demon all wresting for control of his actions.

_I sleep like the dead, no chance of wakin’ her even if I lie down beside her…_

_But could I? With her warm body so close, her neck… the sweet scent of her… gettin’ damn hard just thinkin’ down that route…_

_And if she woke and saw me, just when she seems as though she may be startin’ to trust me… Never been good at bein’ patient. I follow my blood, which doesn’t usually flow in the direction of my brain… like now._

_Bloody hell, she’s gorgeous…_

Cursing his body’s untimely eagerness, Spike loosens the cinch of his belt by a notch, adjusts himself inside the confines of his tight jeans, and just slinks down into a heap on the floor beside the bed, using his folded bloodstained shirt as a pillow.

* * *

His first thought upon waking several hours later is that he’s never really noticed how pleasant mornings smell. Even in the depths of the factory basement, his senses draw out the sweet tones of crisp midwinter air from the world outside. Dawn. New life. Sunshine. Slayer.

The Slayer in the room with him, tightly balled up on the bed, hands over her face, whimpering…

“Buffy?” Spike jumps up to his feet as Buffy’s half-conscious bleating registers in his ears. "Slayer? Easy now, pet..."

He hesitantly reaches for her arms, but she recoils from his room-temperature skin, tangling herself in the musty sheets, her eyes still tightly closed.

“Buffy! You’re havin’ a nightmare.”

This time he weaves his arms under her, lifts her into a somewhat upright position, and supports her against his firm chest. She gasps as her face and hands fall against him, her limbs almost as chilled as the vampire’s, and he rubs one hand down her back, attempting to warm her.

“It… it h-hurts,” she stutters, rigid fingers knotting into the fabric of his t-shirt like she had when he first brought her to the factory.

“Where, sweetheart?”

“All over. Aches. Cold. Make it st-st-stop.”

"I know, lamb. It's a'right. I've got you."

"Angel?"

Spike winces straight through to his heart, but holds her tighter regardless, his chin resting over the top of her head. "Not him, luv. It's just me… it’s Spike. Know I'm the last person dead or alive you'd expect to be holed up with, but I’ll hide you an’ protect you with my life 'till your strength comes back and you can kill the buggers who're after you."

Her eyes open at last, and her hands unclench to press flat against his upper body, feeling the corded muscle beneath the thin cotton.

"S... Sp… Spike?"

"Yeah, pet. Just me. Your ol’ save-the-world pal."

He remains perfectly still, waiting either for her to dissolve back into weepy hysteria or for the Spike-hating part of her to shove him off. For a near minute, neither of them move except for Buffy’s right arm, the angle of her forearm changing gradually until it lies just underneath his ribs, pressed against his cool stomach.

“My… my arm hurts the m-most.”

“From hittin’ Kralik?” asks Spike, his tone soft, almost dulcet. _She’s touchin’ me… puttin’ my body temperature to good use. Can’t heat her up… but I can soothe the hurt…_

“Uh-huh. I… I th-think it might need ice or something, but I’m so cold already.”

“We have ice,” he nods. “I got some last night, after you dozed off.”

“You… you _did_ leave me?” she whispers, partly accusatory, and partly laced with terror.

“I… yeah, I did. I’m sorry. I… your belly was rumblin’. I had to do somethin’. I didn’t lock you down here if that makes you feel any better ‘bout it. I was there an’ back in the space of an hour. You slept the whole time.”

“What if something slimy had wandered down here and eaten me?” she pouts, just a hint of her perky Slayer spark. “Some _protector_ … not that I _need_ anybody’s protection.”

"Mm-hmm,” he smirks. “Well, while I was up an’ about, I gotcha somethin', Buffy."

"What?"

He reaches over to the side of the bed, hoists up the grocery bag, sets his beers and smokes aside, and begins unveiling the other contents, Buffy’s jade eyes widening with each item.

_Water… and aspirin! Thank goodness! If he was a good guy, I’d totally hug him right now… Beef jerky, I guess to help me stay strong, all the protein… Cliff bars! Oatmeal Raisin Walnut is my favorite! He’s the luckiest evil guesser ever!... Ice… more ice… and… he didn’t! Oh my god…_

“Happy Birthday, Buffy,” Spike murmurs, handing her the two packets of Lunchables, still thoroughly cold from their icy insulation. “Little blighters weren’t hard to find at all. I reckoned after offerin’ to dash around a town that has witnessed some truly spectacular kickings of my ass to get you somethin' special, you could’ve made it a bit tougher on m–”

Her head moves so quickly that he immediately wonders if her strength has returned full-force and she’s going to head-butt him. Instead, shock cleaves his brain as her lips form a tiny pucker and peck him on his left cheekbone.

_Soft and hard_ , she thinks, leaning back and watching him for a reaction. _His skin… like velvet over glass… And… did I just do what I think I just did?_

Spike just gapes, the faint sound of her kiss echoing through his gobsmacked brain at a hundred times its actual volume.

“Th-thanks, Spike,” mumbles Buffy, pink-faced, averting her eyes from him. “This… I mean, I know it’s not a big deal, but… this is the best present I’ve gotten so far this year.” _Way better than a generic Hallmark card and “I promise to make it up to you” flowers, or a poetry book and false reassurance that everything will be fine._ “Come to think of it, since I might be st–”

She almost says ‘ _stuck with_ ’ again, but all of a sudden the prospect of spending her birthday with Spike is nowhere near as unpleasant as she would have thought.

“… _Staying_ with you all day, and I won’t see whatever Willow or Giles or Mom got for me, this _is_ my best birthday present.”

Spike’s fairly sure his insides are turning to hot chocolate fondue and melting into a lava lake formation in the general region of his diaphragm.

“You’re, um… you’re welcome, luv…” he croaks out, fingers shaking slightly as he pops the bottle cap off of one of his beers. “Glad you like ‘em. Uh, need help with that?”

Buffy pulls a face but hands him the water bottle, and he snaps off the lid she’d been struggling with for the past few seconds. Uncapping the aspirin, he dumps two tablets onto his palm and returns the water and medicine to her.

“Bugger. I keep thinkin’ of other things I should’ve fetched for you,” he sighs as she swallows the aspirin and takes two gulps of water before tugging open the first of the Lunchables boxes.

“Like what? You did great, super great.”

“Well, clean togs for starters, somethin’ not splotched up with my blood. Should’ve made a run by your house, but I s’pose your mum wouldn't have been kind enough to re-issue an invite after last month, s’pecially if she got the impression I was holdin’ you hostage, which I’m _not_ , of course, but, misrepresentation…”

Buffy ducks her head. “We didn't un-invite you.”

“Come again?”

“My house. We didn't revoke your invitation.”

Spike stares at her, still reeling from the kiss she’d fleetingly bestowed on him, and now even more stunned. _Thought she’d have learned her lesson, lettin’ me waltz back in for cocoa with her mum, pretty as you please… so maybe there’s just a hint of somethin’ in her that doesn’t want to shut me out. Another little dash of trust… guess I’m not as doomed as I thought._

* * *

Interrupted from idly staring at the bouquet her ex-husband had sent their daughter, Joyce Summers sets her coffee mug down on the kitchen countertop and steps into the dining room to answer the telephone.

“Hello?”

“Hiya, Mrs. Summers! It’s Willow.”

“Good morning, Willow, dear.”

Smiling, Joyce carries the phone back into the kitchen. Since the recent misunderstanding over the demon posing as the dead Hansel and Gretel, she feels an above-and-beyond duty to show support for Willow and Buffy’s friendship, even if it means sacrificing time with her birthday girl.

“I was just calling to see if Buffy had an E.T.A. for all the oodles of fun we had planned. She said I should call up at ten and see if she was still being snooze-Buffy.”

“I haven’t heard her moving around in her room. Just a moment, I’ll go check on her…”

Willow waits patiently in her bedroom several blocks away, her eyes scanning over the nail-salon supplies spread over a beach towel. In the hamster cage in the corner, Amy scampers around, adjusting to her new toys and surroundings… and to life as a rat in general. Then Mrs. Summers’s voice returns.

“Willow, dear, Buffy isn’t here. And… her bed doesn’t look like it was slept in. I never heard her come home last night.”

“Are… are you sure?”

Willow’s mind is already racing ahead at a terrifying pace. _Out last night… her birthday… and she probably went to see Angel… oh god, how quickly can I order another Orb of Thesulah?!_

“I’ll, um, I’ll go over to see Giles and, er, ask how late Buffy was over at the library for training, okay, Mrs. Summers?” the redhead says in a rush, already dashing as far towards her closet as the phone cord allows, grabbing her nearest pair of sneakers.

“Oh, yes please, thank you, Willow. Let me give you the number for the gallery…”

Willow scribbles the phone number down with quaking fingers, gives Buffy’s mother a falsely cheery goodbye, and then punches in Xander’s number as soon as Joyce hangs up. Hopping around trying to put her shoes on one-handed, she accidently knocks over one of the polish bottles… and Red Rose spills out in a slowly expanding circle on the beach towel, a sparkling, gory stain.

“Harris’s, this is Xander.”

“Xand! Meet me at Giles’s! Buffy’s missing!”

* * *

_To be continued…_


	7. Side Effects

_Chapter 7: Side Effects_

_For a tiny little thing with barely any meat on her, Slayer sure can wolf down her nosh like the best of 'em_ , Spike smirks, watching Buffy devour the first of the Lunchables packages and one of the Cliff Bars, her bites interspersed with huge swallows of water. _But I s'pose the poor girl was up half the night after nearly bein' frightened to death._

"Feelin' any better after the munchies, luv?" he grins.

"Yeah, a lot… except now I'm kinda sleepy again. What time is it?"

Spike glances at the ceiling, inhaling deeply with a slight roll of his neck. "Reckon it's… ten thirty, give or take."

Buffy giggles. " _Pfft_. You can't tell what time it is from _sniffing_. And that's the ceiling, not the sky, doofus."

" _Vampire_ , kitten," he laughs. "Not just the scent of the mornin' air. It's 'bout the angle of shadows, feelin' of the earth's heat, that sort. All demons have the knack, but bein' on the Hellmouth makes it that much easier."

"Oh. That's cool, I suppose."

"Comes in handy, not havin' to set foot outside to make sure it's safe for the sun-sensitive population."

He runs a hand up through his sleep-tousled hair, pushing it back from his forehead, and then notices Buffy's amused expression. "What?"

"You have sex hair!" she titters. His grin turns suggestive, and she blushes profusely. "Bed! I mean _bed_ hair. Sleep hair. Whatever."

"Do I?" Spike rolls up his eyes, pretending to observe his own mussed white-gold curls, then he just shrugs.

"You don't care?" asks Buffy, eyebrow tilting.

"Nah."

"Thank god! I thought it was a vampire vanity thing, uber-sacred hair."

"What, on account of the Great Poofter? Vanity is his bleedin' middle name." His bright smile alters into a charming smirk. "So… you like my sex hair?"

" _Bed_ hair," Buffy corrects immediately. _Stupid mystery poison must be blocking all my inhibitions_. "And I didn't say I _liked_ it. I just observed. I've only ever seen yours slicked back."

"Get it wet, an' it dries in corkscrews 'nless I gel it straight to my skull," he admits, feeling cool blood pooling in his cheeks, an undead blush. Buffy giggles, then hiccups, leans back against the propped-up pillows, and frowns, rubbing her collarbones to try to relieve the suddenly painful heaviness in her chest.

"Hey… you a'right?" asks Spike, cocking his head and setting his beer on the floor. "Not lookin' quite so chipper, luv."

"Heartburn," she mumbles. "Ate too fast."

"Aw, I'm sorry, pet. Forgot that could happen."

"It's fine. You couldn't have known. And it's not like you're my babysitter."

"Still gettin' babysat at your age, Slayer?" he teases, trying to conjure up her smile again. "Wear your big girl pants when you fight the wee monsters?"

"Oh shut up," she snorts, hiccupping more severely. Her lips press together tightly, as though a bitter tang has filled her mouth.

"Hey, hey, hey… don't be sick now," urges Spike, snatching up another water bottle and nearly fracturing it in his haste to remove the lid. "Take little sips. Careful, luv…"

She nods and accepts the bottle, puckering her lips. "I hate hiccups, almost as bad as getting monster guts on my favorite shoes… or blood on white clothes."

"Yeah, gonna need a hearty amount of bleach to get that stain out," he says, bobbing his head at her spotted blouse. "Should consider wearin' black all the time, like me."

 _God, I love that smile of hers_ …

"You?" snorts Buffy. "You're a fashion disaster! Who are you supposed to be? Billy Idol?"

"Oi! That wanker stole his look from _me_ twenty years ago!" he says, affronted. "Had my hair all fluffed and spiked up, piercings, the whole lot."

" _You_ had _piercings_?" she snickers, staring at his ears but seeing no marks. "Did they heal up or something?"

He simpers, lips drawn together, dripping licentiousness. "Didn't have my _ears_ pierced, sweetheart."

Buffy's eyes go huge and flicker toward his belt before she can stop herself, taking the bait.

"You… ewww! Eww eww eww!"

Spike laughs so hard he falls off the edge of the bed, sending his capped beer bottle rolling away across the floor.

"My _eyebrow_!" he shouts out between laughs. "Had my eyebrow pierced, silly girl, right here over the scar. Can't believe you fell for that one! Got a right dirty mind, luv."

"How was I supposed to know?" she mutters, brick red. "You're an evil vampire dude! I just assumed you'd… you'd be…"

"Kinky?" he smirks, letting the tip of his tongue dance out between his teeth and linger against his upper lip. "Me an' my sex hair."

"You're never gonna let me live that down, are you?" says Buffy, pouting in embarrassment.

In response, Spike intentionally dishevels his hair even further, loosening the sections where the gel still tames it down. _I got her distracted from the achin' in her tummy, that's all that matters_.

"Oh my gosh. It _is_ fluffy!" Buffy snorts with laughter, scooting forward out of the covers. Her hands join his, kneading her knuckles through the silky platinum strands, fingernails barely brushing his scalp.

"That it is, lamb," Spike croaks, his ribald tone vanishing instantly, struggling to keep his eyes on hers and not on the pert little breasts bobbing so close to his face.

" _You_ 're the lamb. I went to a petting zoo in LA when I was a kid, and even the baby lambs' wool wasn't… wasn't as soft as…"

Her voice drops away. Slowly, she registers every part of her body that's in close proximity to Spike – her kneecaps on his thigh, her hands intertwined in the downy cotton on the crown of his head, her elbows on either side of his chin, pressing her cleavage an inch from his barely-open mouth. His gaze remains affixed to her eyes, his Adam's apple bobbing as he repeatedly swallows. If she drops her chin just slightly… accidently, even… she could find out if his pale pink lips are as soft as…

Squeaking as she shoves herself away from him, Buffy scoots backwards until she's flat to the headboard, warily wondering if Spike will pursue her across the bed. He doesn't move except to close his eyes, and his chest shudders with a tiny breath.

"Sorry," she whispers, the single word a quick, fearful bark.

Spike's eyes reopen – azure gems reflecting the candle's sputtering glow – and he smiles hesitantly. "Hey… it's alright, Buffy."

"I didn't mean to… be tempty, or anything."

He chuckles, angling his seated body slightly away from her, hoping she won't notice how very tempted he is.

"I know you didn't mean anythin' like that." _Now, me an' my raging hard-on don't always see matters in the same light…_ "Not mad. Not gonna… do anythin'. What's a little scalp massage between circumstance-thrown friends, eh? Bet my grand-poofter got pissed if you laid a finger on his luscious locks, eh?"

"Well… yeah," she admits. _Friends… he just called us friends. Is that what we are? William the Bloody, slayer of Slayers, considering himself friends with the most helpless Slayer he's ever encountered?_

"For a bloke who hasn't looked in a mirror in two centuries, he takes his self-proclaimed angel-face looks pretty damn seriously," snorts Spike, unaware of the effect his words have galvanized in the girl. "Mister silk shirts and hideous velvet coats and that cardamom stuff he spritzes all over himself like soddin' aftershave."

"That was cardamom? I always thought it was some kind of sandalwood, mentholy stuff."

"Could be. Not like I stand around smellin' him for kicks. Rather just _kick_ him. Buffy…?"

"Hmm?" she asks, perplexed by the sudden seriousness in his voice.

"I… I dunno if you'll think I'm out'a line by sayin' this," he mumbles, almost shyly, "but… you'd be a lot better off without that tosser in your life. He's dangerous, soul or not. Seen him do a whole lot'a things too indecent to repeat to you. Did he ever admit he bit an' sired a boy after he came over all soul-ish?"

Buffy shakes her head, turning a bit pale and wrapping her arms around her churning stomach again – now grumbling from overcapacity, not emptiness.

"Yeah. Did it 'round World War Two. I saw him. Two of us got thrown together in a stolen Nazi submarine, an' the sub was goin' down unless he turned the army boy, Sam, who was the only bloke left alive who could fix it. So Angel sired 'im 'stead of lettin' the poor lad die from his wounds, all because some U.S. admiral bigwig had made him promise to fetch the U-boat. Just… just thought you should know 'bout that, luv. Should know he's not as good an' harmless as he claims."

"Is this really the best time?" she grumbles, not wanting to admit how very right he is. The more she ponders his words, though, the more she realizes how frightened she's often felt since Christmas – remembering the dreams they'd shared, the lust Angel had admitted to.

"Sorry, pet. Just wanted you on the level an' all. Wondered if feelin' ill like you are now has made you wonder how much of a danger he really is to you."

"Stop being so… insightful."

Spike shrugs. "Well, that last bit I actually sort of overheard at the mansion, you tellin' the Great Ponce to sod off and keep his paws to himself. Good on you for that, luv."

"You were there?" she squints. _He knows I left Angel? He knew… this whole time he knew Angel wouldn't be coming to rescue me? That I've been utterly in his hands and he's done nothing to harm me? What kind of a vampire_ is _Spike?_

"Uh..." he backtracks, wondering if he should have kept his gob shut, but the amazed look in her eyes emboldens him. "Yeah, I s'pose the cat's out of the bag now. I dropped by Captain Forehead's place to tell 'im to stay clear of you, before I knew much of anythin' about your weak state. Just a vague rumor floatin' around Willy's place."

" _Great_. Now all the Hellmouth undergobins know I'm…" Buffy snaps her mouth shut, her jaw trembling more severely again.

"Buffy? What'sa matter?" he asks gently, turning back to face her and running his knuckles against her arm. "Cold? Sick rumblings in your belly?"

"Sick," she nods. "And… I k-kinda have to pee."

"Uh… right…" He hops up from the bed and shrugs into his duster. "There's an abandoned dry-cleaners next door, pro'ly have a loo. Would… would you like me to carry you?"

"I th-think I'm okay. Is this whole part of town abandoned?"

"Yeah, reckon it had somethin' to do with the Aurelius lot settin' up shop here for months. Nibbled away all the neighbors. Here, sweets, watch your step."

Securing her hand in his, Buffy follows Spike up the stairs to the gaping maw in the floor, and he lifts her across the gap, pouncing up himself once she's safely at the door. He leads the way through the main floor of the inactive factory, his duster held over his head to shield him from beams of sunlight crisscrossing the room. They exit through a side-door into a narrow alley and dash to the adjacent building, Spike shouldering his way through the door without hesitation.

"Windows aren't boarded up. Might mean nobody knows the owners have snuffed it, so the water's pro'ly still runnin'. Okay, luv… toilet room looks to be down that hall," he gestures, patting himself down to smother any sparks. "I'll wait here, then?"

She nods and whimpers at the same time, running at the closed bathroom door as though seeking sanctuary. Spike watches it slam behind her, stressfully rakes both hands through his hair, and flops down in one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs of the dry-cleaners lobby.

In a quarter of an hour – when Spike is on-edge enough to consider stomping down to the door and banging on it to demand if she's okay – the toilet flushes and Buffy emerges, pasty-faced. She shuffles down the hall without looking at him and sits silently in a seat a couple feet away.

"Buffy?"

"I threw up," she mumbles ashamedly.

"Not pregnant, are you, Slayer?" Spike teases, remembering the old woman at the gas station and her hasty assumptions.

Buffy glowers at him through damp eyes, her mouth quivering as though barely holding in sobs.

"Hey… hey, none of that," he whispers, all joking gone. He stands, crosses over to her, and squats in front of her chair, rubbing her shoulder tenderly. "Just tuggin' your leg is all. Sorry for being a prat."

"I h-hate being sick," she snivels, latching both hands on the crook of his arm as he helps her rise to her feet.

"I know you do, luv… but there might be an up-side. Your system's tryin' to flush out the toxin on its own. Let's nip down back to our hidey-hole, an' you can have yourself s'more water, maybe just the cracker bits outta the other Lunchables pack. Then, come nightfall, I'll take you back home to Mum, a'right?"

"Mmhmm."

Still sniffling, Buffy remains close to his side as they zip across the alleyway and back into the factory. At the stairs, he lifts her without asking, supporting her tiny form in his arms and hurdling the gap easily.

"You're burnin' up, sweetheart," Spike croons, settling her back on the bed. He brushes his thumb over her forehead and notices the hints of tears clinging to her eyelashes. "Want some of that ice now? I could crunch it up in my red shirt, make it like a compress?"

"Mmhmm," she nods again.

Before either of them really realize what he's doing, Spike leans forward and presses a tiny kiss between her eyebrows. She gasps almost indistinctly at the coolness of his lips, just as soft as she'd speculated.

Clearing his throat awkwardly, Spike removes his hands and lips from the surprised Slayer and fumbles with the grocery bag.

 _Nice job you bumblin' git… Still gotta find ways to distract her… Poor thing's gonna work herself into a frenzy from worry_ … C _an't tell her yet that it's possible all this is the fault of her Watcher. Know he's like a father to her… a betrayal like that, an' on her birthday to boot, would hurt her too much, maybe break her will to fight._

"So, cutie," he smiles, handing her another water bottle and crushing up some of the ice into smaller bits, "tell me all the fun that's been had in Sunnyhell since I've been off eatin' three-toed sloths and other rubbish."

* * *

Four disgruntled teenagers shove through the doors of the library and charge at Giles, Faith lingering somewhat behind Xander, Oz, and Willow.

"Her mom doesn't think she came home last night at all!" Willow exclaims, though she'd given all of them this information at least once already.

Faith straddles a chair and grouchily lays her head on the back of it, eager for more Saturday sleep, despite the fact that it's nearly noon by now. Oz and Willow stand by the locked area of books and weapons, and Xander rushes right up to Giles and pounds his palms on the table.

"Giles, did she give you any clue what she'd be doing last night after training? I mean, it's not like her to just take off and not tell us…"

Xander's voice grinds to a halt, remembering this past summer. Willow whimpers and holds Oz's arm a little tighter.

"She w-wouldn't have l-left, though? Right? I m-mean… we had plans. Girly plans. She wouldn't just bail…"

Without meeting the gaze of any of the students, Giles slowly lifts a box from underneath the table and sets the large blue crystal like a centerpiece in the middle of all the books.

"What's up with the rock?" demands Xander, the others all moving closer to inspect the semi-transparent hunk of cobalt.

The Watcher makes no reply, just shakily opens his briefcase and takes out a red leather case, like one for holding fancy pens. Popping it open, he places the case by the crystal, and all four teenagers stare at the huge hypodermic needle and the vial of pale yellow liquid within.

"What is this?" asks Oz, the first of the four to gather his thoughts.

"It's… an organic compound… of muscle relaxants and adrenal suppressers. The effect is t-temporary. Th-the blue crystal has a… a mesmerizing effect. Stare at it for more than a few seconds and it puts one in a deep trance. I've been… administering injections to Buffy… for the past three days."

Xander yelps and throws his jacket over the crystal, knocking over several volumes of demonology.

"You've been pumping B. full of this crap?" shouts Faith, now fully awake and furious. "What the hell for?"

"It's a test," he answers helplessly, removing his glasses and still too ashamed to look any of the Scoobies in the eye. "It's given to the Slayer once she… well, _if_ she reaches her eighteenth birthday. The Slayer is… disabled… and then entrapped with a vampire foe whom she must defeat in order to pass the test."

"Oh my god," Willow bleats, her gaze still fixated on the gigantic needle and solution. "All this time… you saw what it was doing to her, and you didn't say a word!"

"You stuck a needle in her!" yells Xander, facing off with Giles across the desk. "You freaking poisoned her!"

"There was nothing I could do," he murmurs. "In matters of tradition and protocol, I must answer to the Council."

"What do _they_ know?!" Faith shouts. "They're not the ones in the thick of things! Probably piss their pants if they saw a real vampire!"

"But where _is_ Buffy?" Willow demands, her scared voice silencing all the others even though she's nowhere near as loud.

"I don't know," admits Giles. "My role in this was very specific. I was to administer the injections and direct her to the old boardinghouse on Prescott Lane. I've been waiting for instructions but –"

The phone at Giles's desk rings alarmingly, but no one seems to have the willpower to move over and get it, break the tension. At last Oz slips into the office and lifts the receiver.

"Sunnydale High School Library, how can I help you?... Yes, Mr. Giles is here… Yes…" He turns back to the group, holding the phone against his chest. "British guy. Didn't give a name."

Reluctantly, Giles rises to his feet and crosses the room, his glasses abandoned on the table full of books.

"Hello?"

"Rupert Giles?" demands the voice on the other line, a heavy British accent that Giles finds slightly familiar.

"Yes, this is Rupert Giles. To whom am I speaking?"

"Roger Wyndam-Pryce."

"Oh. Oh, yes, hello, Roger. Why have –?"

"This is not the time for pleasantries. My son and I are flying over directly. Due to extenuating circumstances, I have been made Director on Travers' last orders. We have reason to believe he was killed by Zachary Kralik following the death of your Slayer."

"Death of…"

Giles misses the desk chair as he slumps to his knees against the doorframe of the office. The four Scoobies rush over, eyes wide and hearts thumping frantically.

"You're… you're sure?" stammers Giles, sweat breaking out on his forehead. "Buffy… by Kralik…"

"Not by Kralik. Travers gave Code Rong-Wood. You know what that means, I presume," Mr. Wyndam-Pryce replies, his tone condescending.

"William the Bloody," Giles whispers, his face ashen. "Spike. Oh dear Lord…"

"Spike?!" gasps Xander, hands balling into fists, panic lacing his tone. "What's happened? Where's Buffy? Who's on the damn phone?!"

"All we hope is that he didn't turn her," continues the voice in Giles's ear. "A vampire with the strength of a Slayer would be fearsome indeed. At any rate, you've been relieved of duty. My son, Wesley, will assume all forthcoming Watcher duties relating to Miss Lehane. We'll be arriving in California by the next flight. I suggest you make preparations to give a full report to the Council."

"I… understand…" Giles shudders, his teeth chattering, moisture filling his eyes.

"Good man."

With a faint _click_ , the new Council Director hangs up, and the phone slips from Giles's hand and hangs suspended from the coiled cord like a lynched body.

"Giles?" whispers Willow tremulously. "Who… who was…?"

"An old friend… or, a council member t-to be exact… the newly appointed Director. Travers is dead. And… and Buffy…"

"No…" gasps Xander. "No, she can't be. Your buddy's lying! She can't…"

"Code Rong-Wood means th-that Spike has… f-found her and… killed…"

"No! No no no!" sobs Willow, cringing into Oz's shoulder. "Not Buffy!"

"Way I see it, _you_ 're the one who killed her," snarls Faith. She shoves Xander's coat off the hypnotizing crystal, snatches it up, and flings it against a shelf of books. The hefty gem shatters into jagged shards, littering the carpeted area. "What now? We go find this Spike and stake him clean through, right?"

Giles shakes his head, still unable to stand from the floor of his office. "Director Wyndam-Pryce is fl-flying here presently."

"Oh God… Oh God." Willow lifts her head, her tear-stained face staring around at her peers. "Buffy's mom… how are we gonna tell Mrs. Summers?"

"My… my responsibility," whispers Giles, finally able to work his quivering hand into his pocket and withdraw his handkerchief. "I'll… I'll tell Joyce."

"Well we're not just going to sit around and wait for this Director Pryce guy to get here," grumbles Faith. She grabs a crossbow out of the caged enclosure, her face set and cold. "I'm the Slayer now. Time to find this Spike vamp and give it to him good."

"You can't," Giles insists. "The greater threat here is Kralik. As a mortal he murdered and tortured more than a dozen women before he was committed to an asylum for the criminally insane. As a vampire, he –"

"So Buff was supposed to fight a _psychotic_ vampire while she was all weak and powerless? What kind of sick test was this?"

"How could you do this to her?" cries Willow, shying away from Giles as though he's a total stranger.

The broken Watcher has no answer.

* * *

_Circling the pain inside my soul_   
_I reached inside your silence_   
_To steal what you won't show_   
_I tried to find the answers in my fears_   
_But what was found is lost again_   
_As soon as it appears_   
_Take it all away... Take it all away..._

* * *

"And creepy old men in the diner kept squeezing my ass," Buffy mumbles with a shudder, finishing her tales about living in LA over the summer.

"You have a juicy ass, Slayer. Wouldn't mind squeezin' it myself," shrugs Spike, sitting just far enough away on the bed to avoid the half-hearted, weak punch she swings at him.

"You're a pig, Spike." But her eyes are bright, lips smirking, nearly giggling as she says it.

"What? A bloke's allowed to have eyes, in't he?" he replies, equally smiling. "You're quite fetchin', you know, luv."

"Stop it," she snickers, a hint of pinkish color riding up her cheeks.

"Not a chance, gorgeous," grins Spike. He rolls onto his stomach at the foot of the bed, basking in her smile and the pride of having put it there himself.

The past two hours have been the closest taste of heaven he's ever likely to experience -- casual, sweet, relaxed and warm, just chatting like chums. She'd managed to keep down the second Cliff bar and the crackers from the other Lunchables box, interspersing bites with sips of water and their friendly conversation.

Buffy stretches her arms over her head, yawning widely, her brows suddenly knotting up.

"Buffy?"

"It's nothing. My head just hurts again."

He immediately stands, swings his legs off the bed, and kneels to dig through the grocery bag for the aspirin. Snatching up her half-full water bottle, he shakes two pills into his palm and offers them to Buffy.

"Thanks, Spike."

 _Anything for you, my love_ … "You're welcome, pet. Just want you feelin' better, is all."

She takes her medicine and then slumps against the headboard of the bed, rubbing her neck and frowning. Warily, Spike pops his knuckles one-by-one as he watches her fretting movements.

"Neck hurt too?"

"Uh-huh, like there are big ol' knots in my skull," she pouts.

He makes up his mind faster than he should have. Far faster.

"Scoot over, luv," he whispers, joining her at the head of the bed and adjusting her so he can sit half-behind, half-beside her.

"Spike? What... ohh…"

Buffy gasps slightly as his chilled fingertips cradle the base of her skull, drawing tiny circles against her skin, massaging her neck and scalp.

"Like that, sweets?"

"Yeah… wow…"

Her eyes close, and she leans back against his gently rubbing fingers, the coolness of his body a welcomed contrast to the low fever of hers.

"Just tell me when all the smartin' goes away… and I'm sorry I reek of blood, by the by."

He indicates his crimson-soaked shoulder and chest, lifting her golden hair to keep it off the most stained sections as his hands continue their tender motions.

"I don't blame you," shrugs Buffy. "I mean… I _do_ blame you, because killing people and drinking their blood is wrong. It doesn't just smell too strongly, though."

"Most of this is either from me gettin' shot before I found you or from that bastard who made a pass at you, if that helps. I don't _think_ I killed him, 'nless he died of shock afterwards. Deserved it," he grumbles. _Deserved gettin' his throat ripped out for wantin' to lay a hand on my girl… my Slayer…_

For a while, neither of them speak again, Buffy's posture slowly sinking closer and closer to Spike until her head is resting on his shoulder, his kneading hands working down from her neck to her back, and then returning to twine through her hair. He leans his cheek against her flaxen mane and breathes deep, a soft sigh of pleasure escaping his lips.

"Are you sniffing my hair?" queries Buffy with a little snort.

"Mmm… yeah, kitten…"

Grinning behind her back, he holds his right hand at her waist to keep her from squirming away and then buries his face directly in her tresses, inhaling until his lungs seem ready to burst from the magnificent scent of her.

Instead of pulling away, Buffy just giggles tiredly, the pain reliever and the massage combining to make her sleepy yet again.

"You know if you'd come back, and I wasn't all powerless, and you'd done that, I'd've kicked your ass."

"Oh? You sure you don't want to just squeeze it instead?" he teases.

Her elbow digs slightly into his ribs, wresting light chuckles out of both of them, and then his hands return to work, probing away all her aches and pains.

"You were right," Buffy mumbles after another minute of his caressing massage, only a trace of crankiness in her tone.

"Glad to hear it. Er... right 'bout what?"

"Me and Angel... that we can't just be _friends_. Kind-of an all or nothing deal."

"Yeah. Know the feelin'." He sighs, his hands stilling, his right still at her waist, his left bending behind his own head. He stares off into space, concentrating on the gentle breaths of the girl leaning against him.

"You do?"

"Yeah. Spent a hundred years bendin' over backwards – sometimes literally – for the woman I loved. Nothin' I wouldn't do for 'er. We had our bad... erm, years, perhaps. Like that whole incident with the Immortal. Don't ask," he mutters when Buffy's mouth opens. "Point is, I was faithful to her... and the second she sniffed somethin' off about me, she rabbitted. Pixies in 'er head told 'er I was muckin' about with sunshine."

"Well, you did get half your hand almost burned off," Buffy points out, smiling over her shoulder at him.

"That wasn't the sunshine she was blatherin' on about, luv."

There's a desolate sort of loneliness in his voice, and she has no response, a suspicion slowly building in her mind, while at the same time she's gawking at herself for the bizarre position in which she's found herself.

_I'm lying here… on a bed… with the slayer of Slayers at my back… and I don't have a trace of fear… if anything, I feel… loved…_

"You tired, Buffy?" Spike murmurs, fingertips of his left hand coasting up and down her arm, cool and soothing.

"A little…"

"You can nod off if you'd like. Nothin' we can do 'till sunset. You can sleep. You warm enough?"

She nods, her head brushing his collarbone, and then turns slightly, looking up into his gemstone-blue eyes.

"You won't leave me alone again, will you? Please don't leave me."

"A'course not," he promises quickly, his lips barely grazing over her temple. "Don't you worry. Just relax, luv. Pro'ly be back to pun-spoutin' and powerful when you wake up."

She nuzzles closer, finding the optimum comfy spot in his room-temperature arms… and then stills completely, realizing what she's just done. _Cuddling. I'm cuddling Spike… This is the weirdest birthday ever._

"Buffy?"

"Nothing. I'm… I'm just glad I have you, Spike."

He swallows, his arms embracing her a little tighter.

"Yeah," he whispers, too faintly for even Slayer ears to pick up. "You've got me good, luv."

_To be continued…_


	8. Coats and Cars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Quoted lyrics are from 'Baby I Love You' by The Ramones. Also, a lot later, bridge lyrics from RED's "Take It All Away". And of course, all lines from the actual episode are accredited to David Fury, screenwriter of "Helpless".

_Chapter 8: Coats and Cars_

The doorbell of 1630 Revello Drive jangles just after sunset, and Joyce crosses from the dining room into the foyer to answer it.

"Rupert," she smiles, opening the front door wide at the sight of the librarian. "Do come in. Forgive the mess. I was just looking over some bills. Glass of water?"

"Oh… yes, thank you, please. Splendid."

The Watcher is too ashamed to meet her gaze – already feeling guilty enough that he'd waited this long to visit the Summers's house in the fruitless hope that Buffy would show up by nightfall, alive and unharmed. He follows Joyce inside the house and hangs his coat on the rack by the door as she moves into the kitchen.

"Willow didn't try to call me at the gallery, did she?" asks Mrs. Summers, filling a glass at the sink. "I was very busy, but there weren't any messages left for me, so I assumed she and Buffy just got caught up in spending time together. I can't remember whether or not she said she planned to sleep over or not…"

"Joyce…"

Giles clears his throat shakily, and Buffy's mother - unaware of his torment - enters the dining room and offers him the glass.

"Yes, Rupert?"

"I… B-Buffy has…"

"Wait," she tilts her head, her eyes fixing on the front door again. "Do you hear that?"

He falls silent and listens with her, the faintest noise touching their senses… like muffled crying, nearly indistinct. Curious, Joyce steps out onto the front porch, Giles quickly following. Both adults immediately spot the shape curled into a fetal position by the railing, the source of the childlike whimpering, a form swathed in a red fleece coat.

"Buffy?" asks Joyce in alarm, reaching out for the figure. Giles stands just behind her, his mouth flopping open like a gasping fish, torn between flabbergasted relief and horrified doubt.

"Joyce, don't…"

The crouched figure rolls over, and Kralik's vampire grin snarls menacingly up at them. "Mother," he leers.

Joyce screams, and Giles thrusts his hand in his suit pocket for a cross, but then his footing falls out from under him and his vision goes dark, as Blair, the mad fledgling, sinks his fangs into the Watcher's throat.

* * *

" _Have I ever told you… how good it feels to hold you… It isn't easy to explain…_ "

Somewhere in the idyllic blur between sleeping and waking, Buffy hears a voice brushing against her ear, matching the cool hand caressing through her hair. Perfectly comfortable and warm, she listens to Spike quietly singing, almost crooning.

" _I can't live without you… I love everything about you… I can't help it if I feel this way… Oh I'm so glad I found you… I want my arms around you… I love to hear you call my name… Baby, I love you… Baby, I love you... Baby, I love, I love only you..._ "

She smirks and nestles closer against him, pretending to continue sleeping, but her tiny movement doesn't escape his notice, and his sensitized ears pick up on her increased heartbeat.

"Oh, bugger," Spike mutters under his breath, deeply chagrined that she'd heard his whispers. He clears his throat anxiously. "Uh... hi, Buffy. Didn't mean to wake you. I mean… I was _about to_ wake you, since it's gettin' on to nearly seven. Figured you'd want to mosey on home soon."

"You really _do_ sing," she smiles, ready to tease him a bit. "What song was that?"

"Oh, uh... just somethin' by the Ramones. Didn't mean for... nevermind."

"Remember when we couldn't think of a cover story and we told my mom we were in a band?"

"A'course I do," he grins, his hand stroking through her hair again. _Remember every moment I've been near you, pet… 'cept maybe those bits when I was well and truly sloshed on my last visit_. "You play the triangle."

"Drums," she corrects him, playfully digging her elbow into the nearest part of him she can reach.

"Oh hey now!" Spike exclaims, catching her arm. "Easy on the goods, darlin'."

Using a hand on his chest, Buffy pushes herself upright immediately, realizing too late that in her sleep she'd slipped down so that instead of lying propped against his torso, she was instead reclined between his legs, with her head and folded hands on his left thigh… and that her elbow had jabbed him right in the groin.

"Sorry!" she mumbles, blushing bright red.

"Didn't hurt anythin' important," he smiles back at her, his hand lingering protectively between her elbow and his jeans zipper. "I'm just lucky you're not at top form."

"I… I really didn't mean to."

She's suddenly clued in to their closeness – their faces a mere foot apart, hips almost touching – and her fingers reflexively tighten on her fistful of the black cotton over his heart. Her gaze jumps rapidly from his shielding hand up to his eyes, then drift a little lower to his mouth, full lower lip inadvertently tantalizing her.

"No worries, luv… really." _Whatever is that look for? Hot as could be, though, like she wants to bite me…_ "So, uh, you feel any better after your shut-eye?"

She shrugs, and then, to his utmost surprise, leans back against him, burrowing her cheek and arms into his chest, breathing in the woodsy musk of leather and smoky menthol, tinged with the coppery scent of blood. Pure Spike.

"Less achy. No stronger, though, and still kinda dizzy," she sighs, trailing her knuckles up and down his suddenly stock-still upper body, his cool muscles rigid in what almost seems like fear. "Spike?"

_Brain's not catchin' up to my body… s'pecially not a certain part… oh, bollocks, that'll shatter this paradise right quick if she feels…_

Clearing his throat again, Spike reluctantly lifts her forward so he can swing both his legs over the side of the bed and stand, hiding the stiffening wood between his thighs from her sight.

_I'm bein' a stupid, wishful git. Only reason the poor girl's willin' to get within a hundred yards of me is this poison that's been pumped into her. She's toleratin' me outta some kind of Stockholm Syndrome. She doesn't want me, and there's no way in hell she could ever love me. Time to tell her the truth 'bout this mess… and then whisk her back to Mum._

"Spike?" Buffy repeats, her face awash with anxiety.

"It's nothin'. Uh… reckon it's safe to leave now, if you fancy goin' home."

"Spike, what's the matter? What did I do?"

_Did he think I wanted to kiss him?_ Did I _want to kiss him? Oh my god… I did. I wanted to kiss Spike. I_ do _want to kiss Spike. This has been the craziest twenty-four hours of my life! This time yesterday, I was breaking up with Angel… and now I'm crushing on William the Bloody! What is it with me and the hot vampires?!_

"Nothin's wrong, 'cept you bein' hurt an' helpless," Spike sighs, completely oblivious to Buffy's sudden realization. He braces himself, wishing he'd bought something stronger than those two little beers to help buck up his courage. "Buffy, I think… maybe we should stop by your Watcher's flat first. To see… if he has an antidote."

"Why?" she demands, confused by both his sudden low spirits and his suggestion. "Giles didn't know what was wrong with me."

"I… I think he does, luv. Part of his job." His arousal now curbed enough, he faces her again, and Buffy stares back at him, still clueless.

"Spike, I don't…"

"I… I sussed it out, luv, the thing that's happened to you. It's called... Cruciamentum. Er, not the poison whatsit, the reason for it. It's a test for Slayers, given on their eighteenth birthday, thereabouts. Council finds a way to weaken the Slayer an' see if she can outsmart some beastie they trap her up with. My guess is Kralik was supposed to be your mark, but he escaped, pro'ly drained his guards an' turned that bloke who was with him."

"The… the Council? But, h-how… Giles wouldn't let them…"

Spike shrugs and leans against the bed's footboard, scratching behind one ear. " 'Fraid he must've been involved somehow, Buffy. Been doin' anythin' odd in trainin' lately? Somethin' where you might have been distracted?"

"N-no… unless…"

_The blue crystal… when I focused… and things seemed to blur, and I couldn't do anything but stare and think. Oh god, no… not Giles…_

She cowers back against the pillows, heart hammering, teeth chattering, paralyzed by anger and horror and betrayal. Tears prickle in her eyes, and Spike kneels down to fumble with the bag of remaining foodstuffs, fighting the desire to hold her, to mop away her tears with his lips and tongue and then kiss her until she forgets everything but his name.

"Say something," Buffy begs, furious drops starting to stream down her face.

"Dunno what to say, luv," he sighs, looking up and inwardly punching himself for causing her so much grief with his conjectures. "Was waitin' on you for the first move."

"I… I c-can't believe this. Th-that Giles could do this to m-me. He… he would never… he's like my dad… He's _more_ than my dad. Spike, he couldn't…"

"I'm sorry, Buffy. If I'm wrong, you can hate my guts all you like. Just tellin' you what I s'pect, what seems to make the most sense."

"N-no… no, no he… oh god, S-Spike…"

The sobs come fast and heavy, shaking her body with their intensity. Deserting the groceries, Spike catches her up in his arms as she slumps sideways, falling off the bed entirely.

"Shh… shh, luv… I'm sorry… I'm so sorry, Buffy…"

On the floor now, he draws her onto his lap, and her quivering hands clutch him, nails biting into the skin of his shoulders. His arms loop across her back, gripping her tightly.

"Please… Buffy, my love, please try to calm down… you'll just make yourself sick again. Please, dearest love…"

Even through her racking sobs, she hears the difference – the change from an accented pet name into a term that suggests more than endearment, more than "circumstance-thrown friends", as he'd previously put it. And then an inconceivable notion crashes though her brain, displacing even the shock of her Watcher's treachery.

_Sunshine…_ I'm _the sunshine… Drusilla left him because he fell in love with me…_ Spike _is in love with_ me _…_

"Buffy? You a'right?" he murmurs softly in her ear as her weeping gasps suddenly halt. _Daft question, 'course she's not a'right_. "I mean…"

"No!" whimpers Buffy, squirming even closer into his arms as he reluctantly starts to draw away. She clings to him, one hand around his waist, and the other at the back of his neck, not even caring that she's pulling his face into her throat, drowning him in her scent.

"Oh, Buffy…"

"Stay! Hold me. Spike, t-tell me I'm gonna be okay. Please tell me it'll s-stop…"

Her crying jag starts up again, and Spike groans with her, giving in to his repressed longing. He brushes his lips against every bit of the side of her face he can reach, blotting the tears off her cheek and jaw and chin.

"I've got you, Buffy. I'm here, love. It'll be a'right. It'll stop, an' I'll be at your side 'till it does. My dear, sweet girl…"

He cradles the back of her head in his long fingers, smoothing her tangled blonde mop, groaning again when her hands stroke up and down his back. Her sobs slowly peter out as exhaustion sets in, his arms gently rocking her all the while.

"Spike…" she sniffles, eventually lifting her tear-streaked cheek against his cool one, "p-please, Spike, take m-me home."

"Of course, love."

With one more soft kiss to her temple, he stands, raising her up and momentarily setting her on the bed so he can snatch up his red shirt and the grocery sack.

"Here… layer up in these. Smells like it's bitter cold tonight."

"Temperatures have smells?" she asks tearfully, letting him fit her arms into first his silk overshirt – the blood having mostly washed out with the melting ice – and then his duster.

"Sure, they do. Well... seasons do, at least," Spike smiles, briefly cupping her cheek in his palm and thumbing away the last of her teardrops before he places the paper bag beside her and compacts the remaining contents into the smallest possible package. "Winter smells like campfire wood smoke, and hot cocoa, and sprigs of evergreen… what's the matter, Slayer?"

"Your coat's kinda heavy," she murmurs, trying to push the sleeves up, but the bulky leather resists.

"Don't you fret about that. It'll keep you toasty warm, an' that's the point. Hold this, will you, luv?"

Buffy catches her breath in a quick gasp as he deposits the grocery bag on her lap and then swiftly scoops her up in a bridal carry, an arm around her back, the other under her knees. His long coat reaches past her ankles, enveloping her like a windproof parka.

"Right then. Straight home… or drop by your Watcher's flat and give 'im a good threatenin'?" asks Spike with a roguish grin. "It's on the way, in't it?"

The edge of her mouth quirks, imagining the look of utter shock and hours of subsequent head scratching that will take place if she shows up on the doorstep of Giles's apartment in the arms of her former enemy. Spike's Cheshire-cat smile turns tender suddenly, and she ducks her head against the crook of his neck to ward off the returning urge to meet his lips with hers.

"Yeah… let's go to Giles's."

"A'right, pet. Hey… just got an' even better idea. We can _drive_ there."

"Drive?"

"Yeah, I left my car at the welcome center right off Highway 17, couple blocks from here. I, uh, might've knocked over the sign again."

"Again? Is that just 'your thing', your signature move? Come to Sunnydale, smash the town sign?"

"Pretty much," he chuckles lightly as he crosses the basement and ascends the stairs, avoiding the rebar-strewn hole.

"You're _so_ bad," she teases, comfortably nestled against his chest and shoulder.

His coat insulates everything but her face from the chilly January wind as he carries her from the factory, through the alleyway by the abandoned dry cleaner's, and down a side street. Spike's sharp blue eyes scan every nook and opening they pass, warily watching for Kralik, other vampires, or lewd riffraff like last night's construction workers, but nothing seems odd except the broken front window of a camera shop on Quincy Street.

"Comfy, Slayer?"

"Very," she smiles, turning up the leather duster's collar to keep her neck even warmer.

"Excellent. Just 'round this bend, an' then you'll be snug and toasty in my auto. Dear ol' rustbucket's rather antique, but I'm fairly sure the heater still… works…"

They arrive at the edge of the parking lot near town hall, and Spike halts so suddenly that Buffy nearly falls out of his arms.

"Spike?"

Without responding to her whisper, he sets her on her feet and walks a few steps away, eyes roving the lot. She bundles the coat around her shivering body as he paces a wide circle around the vacant asphalt, finding no sign of the DeSoto except black tread marks where his tires had squealed to a halt against the curb.

"What... the... hell?"

"Spike?"

"It's gone! Buffy, it's gone! What the soddin' hell?! They've bloody gone and towed my car!" He continues staring frantically around the lot, getting more and more pissed when his beloved DeSoto doesn't magically reappear.

"Are… are you gonna cry?" Buffy giggles, not sure why she finds his apoplectic fit so amusing.

"It's not funny!" he growls, hands raking stressfully through his hair. His voice comes out in a snarl that sounds both incensed and terrified, the muscles in his neck straining and rigid, fists clenching. "I love that car! Damn Sunnydale! Dammit! I hate this bloody town!"

She _should_ be scared witless, alone in the dead of night in an abandoned parking lot with a seething vampire. He's raging, homicidally mad… and to Buffy, he's beautiful.

"It's a bleedin' 1959 Adventurer! With gold and white vinyl upholstery! It's _vintage_! When I get my hands on the soddin' schmucks who – mmf!"

In one smooth motion – the closest she's felt to being a Slayer in days – Buffy snags his hand in hers, tugs him around to face her, and pulls him forward until she can plant her lips on his, a swift sharp kiss that echoes across the blank parking lot.

Wide-eyed, Spike backs up a step, staring in confounded shock at her. Buffy raises her hand to her mouth, as if to feel the trace of coolness left on her lips from the instant of contact, jolted by her own action.

_What… did I just… did I really just…?_

"Buffy…"

Spike moans her name as he tugs her in close and dips her, one arm around her waist, the other at her hair. He kisses her deeply, recklessly, pouring in every unspoken prayer for her love, as though at any instant he could dissolve into dust from sheer euphoria. Buffy's fingers find his shirt collar and cling on for dear life. He tastes sweet and smoky, delicious and forbidden, his soft lips kneading hers.

They might have remained like that until the sun rose, if not for Buffy's human lung capacity.

"S… Spike... wow," she gasps when they finally right themselves, Spike's arms still tight around her as though afraid she'll float away on the chilly wind if he lets go.

"Yeah," he pants, his brain finally realizing what has transpired over the last ten seconds. Painstakingly slow, he softens his hold on her, hands sliding from her back to rest tenderly on her shoulders, his eyes examining her face for outrage or horror. "Did… did that really just happen, luv? Nothin' knocked me on the head when I wasn't lookin'?"

"Yeah, I… I kissed you… and you kissed me back," Buffy whispers, still breathless.

"Funny ol' world, in't it?" he grins nervously. "Uh… you a'right, luv? Not gonna go lookin' for anythin' sharp an' wooden the moment we get to your Watcher's, are you?"

"N-no… that was…"

_Deliberate_. _Honest. Uninhibited…_ and unmistakably the hottest kiss she'd ever had, no trace of the hesitancy that always seemed to color Angel's kisses. _And_ , Buffy stores the note away in her brain for posterity _, Spike did_ not _vamp out…_

"Good," she concludes, remembering he's still waiting for her verdict. "It was good, Spike. A lot good. Buckets of good… and I'm just gonna stop talking now before my brain falls out."

He grins. "Nice of you to stroke a bloke's fragile ego now an' again."

"And… you liked?" asks Buffy, a little tentative.

"Better than I ever imagined," he whispers fervently. _And the dandy poet takes center stage another bloody time_. "Uh, right… still got a Watcher to scare, eh, Buffy?"

"Okay."

He could've sworn that heated lifeblood rushes through his veins as she slips her small hand into his, bundling his coat collar even higher around her ears to ward off the January wind.

"I am sorry about your car," she murmurs when they've gone a few more blocks in silence. "I think stuff gets towed to the police station. Cordelia had her convertible towed one time for double parking. There might be a fee to get it back, 'cuz I think I remember her griping about it."

"If there is, I'll just win some bob at poker next time I go to Willy's," shrugs Spike. "And I s'pose I'll have to see 'bout a demon forger as well. Had a counterfeit license when I bought the car, but doubt the coppers'll skim over the fact that it was issued in 1960."

_And to think, a couple days ago I would've just eaten 'em. S'pose I'll have to start baggin' blood for this girl, like the Great Poof. But I'll do it. She wants me to drink pig, I'll drink pig. Hell, I'll drink bloody cyanide if she fancies it._

More spring in her step than she's had all week, Buffy points out Giles's apartment complex as soon as they reach his street, leads Spike down the stairs into the small courtyard, walks right up to the door of the flat, and raps her fist on it.

Spike stands behind her, sniffing the air curiously. _No sign of the Watcher… but somethin' definitely off. That taste again… bitter as I breathe it in…_ "Hey, luv, don't think he's here. No heartbeat in the place, so far as I can tell."

"Giles!" calls Buffy exuberantly, her heart rate still beating an amplified staccato against her ribs from Spike's kiss. "Hey, Giles! You here?"

Spike moves over to the window and peers through the curtains while Buffy fishes the spare key out from under the doormat and lets herself in.

"Coming, Spike?"

"Can't. Occupant of the flat has to invite me, an' it doesn't seem likely for that to happen anytime soon."

"Oh. Right." Searching solo, she peeks into the kitchen, living room, and then hollers up the stairs, but there's no answer whatsoever. "I don't know why he wouldn't be here," says Buffy sullenly, entering the courtyard again and leaning against the doorframe. "No school and no _me_ , so he wouldn't have a reason to be at the library."

"Unless he got all overcome with worryin' 'bout you disappearin'. Wanna give the place a ring, see if he answers?"

"Oh, of course!"

Spinning around, she rushes back to the flat's small kitchen for the telephone, Spike watching with a grin from under the front eaves, his keen eyes following her movements and then roving the room when she stills, the phone pressed to her ear.

"Answering machine," pouts Buffy, when an automated version of Giles's voice is her only reply. "Hey, um, Giles. It's me. Hope you're not, uh, worrying about me or something. I'm still all sick and stuff… but I'm fine. Better than fine. Kind of a crazy story actually."

She smiles at Spike, only to quirk her eyebrows at the suddenly sober look on his face, his gaze fixed on something in the living room, the couch blocking her view.

"Uh, anyway, I'm tired… so I'm gonna go home. I guess I'll see you on Monday. Bye."

Buffy sets the phone back in its cradle and turns back to Spike. "So weird. Where would he be if not here or at the school? Spike?"

"On the coffee table," he breathes. _That scent… the poison… I knew it. I bloody knew it._

Curious, Buffy rounds the couch and picks up the little red leather case, apparently the thing that has caught Spike's fixed attention. "This?"

"Yeah…"

She returns to the doorway and holds it out to him, her hand crossing the threshold, but instead of taking it, Spike just pops open the case, revealing the syringe and the bottle of yellow fluid. One sniff, and he's certain.

"This is it, luv," he murmurs, removing the vial and rotating it in his hands until the tiny label is visible. " _Side effects: confusion, dizziness, poor appetite, lethargy, headache, nausea, tightness in the chest, chills, fever…_ "

Buffy pales, staring at the hypo in the case as though it's a venomous asp, her hands trembling as Spike places the little glass tube back beside the needle.

"Love, I'm so sorry…"

With a furious, frightened cry, she hurls the case across the room, shattering it against the wall by the stairs, and then falls into Spike's arms, broken and betrayed.

* * *

_I'm breaking; I can't do this on my own_  
Can you hear me screaming out?  
Am I all alone?

_You take away...  
You take away..._

* * *

 

Joyce regains consciousness to a jarring flash and the _whir_ of a developing polaroid, and she whimpers fearfully, realizing her hands are tied to chair arms and a gag has been knotted across her mouth. Back-to-back with her, also bound and gagged, Giles wakes blearily, his raw neck wound aching.

"Hello, Mother," chuckles Kralik, stepping around the two of them, camera flashing away. "May I call you Mother? My own mother was a person with no self-respect of her own… so she tried to take mine."

Joyce shies away, barely able to turn her head and escape the glaring light as he takes another picture. Giles struggles against his ropes as well, but can't move an inch.

"When I'm ten years old, she has the scissors, you see," Kralik continues nostalgically. "You wouldn't believe what she took with those… But she's dead to me now… mostly because I killed and ate her."

Joyce lets out a muffled scream, which only makes Kralik chuckle harder.

"I have a problem with mothers. I'm aware of that. But it doesn't matter, because soon… I'll have your daughter. I won't kill her. I'll just make her like me. Different. She'll go to sleep, and when she wakes up…" He kneels by Joyce and takes a picture directly in her eyes. "…Your face will be the first thing she _eats_."

"Yrr – trr – lrrt," Giles protests, hampered by his gag.

"What's that?" grins Kralik, reaching around Joyce's ear and roughly yanking away the cloth from Rupert's mouth.

"You're... too late, Kralik," gasps the Watcher. "You can't hurt Buffy anymore."

"Oh, yes, that's _right_ ," the vampire nods, standing and circling until he's face to face with the stony-eyed and spectacle-less Giles. "Say it loud and clear, Watcher man. Tell this fine, scared lady that her darling little girl's dead in a ditch somewhere, her blood in the gullet of a luckier vampire than me. Tell her."

Giles glares straight into the wicked amber eyes of the demon, and then hangs his head shamefully. "William the Bloody…"

"Funny thing about Bloody Will," interrupts Kralik, too gleeful to be patient, twirling the camera in his pale hands. "The old boy likes to brag. Hundred and some odd years, but the restraint of a teenager. If he'd killed the Slayer, like I thought at first, it'd be up and down town by now. He'd be at the nearest demon bar buying drinks all around, new Master of the Hellmouth, partying in the streets. Which means… he's either taking his good, sweet time... riding her hard and nibbling at her bone marrow… or he let her go, which is the much better case for you two, all things considered. Lot less likely, though."

Joyce gives a terrified whimper behind the gag, tears streaming down her cheeks at the thought of what Kralik's words depict. Shuddering in equal horror, Giles tries to reconcile his brief phone conversation with their vicious captor's suggestion.

"But… Travers gave the…"

"You and your Council codes," Kralik snorts, snapping a polaroid of Giles's astonished expression. "Poor, tasty man was delirious. Once you peel off the fingernails, the brain tends to go all mushy, makes him very open to all kinds of suggestions. And what a lovely picture I painted for him, the fragile girl all weepy at Bloody Will's feet."

"You bastard!"

The vampire throws back his shaggy head and laughs at Giles. "That's almost exactly what he said when I pulled out his teeth. Dear Old Director T went down to hell with quite a guilty conscious, let me tell you. Saving you a seat down there, huh Watcher man? What'cha gonna say? Killed an innocent, little girl on orders? Makes you no better than me, except of course… I kill for fun."

Half ignoring Kralik's continuing monologue, Rupert stares at the door to the darkened room encasing him and Joyce, his thoughts wholly consumed by the impossible hope Kralik's words have kindled.

_She's alive_...

* * *

 

_To be continued..._


	9. Darkness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: All lines from the actual episode are accredited to David Fury, screenwriter of "Helpless". I highly recommend looking up "'Take It All Away' by RED" on YouTube and listening to it when Spike and Buffy get to the Sunnydale Arms.  
> Warning: The battle is gory, as per the episode.

_Chapter 9: Darkness_

They slip into 1630 Revello through the back door, Buffy still shaken and wet-faced from crying, Spike silently rubbing her shoulder during the whole walk. As they enter the kitchen, she pauses, gives the flower arrangement a long stare, and then shoves the whole bundle off the island into the trash bin.

"Uninvited suitor?" asks Spike, hoping to earn one of those precious smiles he's quickly grown to love.

"Just my dad," Buffy mumbles. Leaving Spike's duster on one of the kitchen barstools, she moves into the dining room, cocks her head at the glass of water left on the table, and lifts her eyes to see the ajar front door.

"Mom?" she calls out, and when no one answers, she swallows hard and steps to the open door.

Spike rounds the corner of the dining room just in time to see her pull two small polaroid photos off the doorframe, tiny pieces of tape securing the images to the wood. Buffy stares, flips them over, and then shows them to Spike, her eyes frightfully wide again.

The first is of Joyce, Kralik behind her with his hand at her throat, and the single word 'COME' written in silver sharpie. The second photo shows Giles on the ground, neck hemorrhaging badly, and on the reverse side is simply 'HURRY'.

"Spike…"

Her hand reaches out for his arm and clenches nearly hard enough to bruise, even without her extraordinary strength.

"We'll save her, luv…" murmurs Spike as his arms slide around her waist and his lips brush her hair comfortingly.

"He's g-got my mom…"

"Buffy, we'll find her, I swear. Accordin' to Willy, Kralik's holed up at the Sunnydale Arms, a boardin' house on the edge of town."

"I'm gonna k-kill him," she whispers, clutching her other hand around the photos, fury forming alongside the tears in her eyes. "I'm gonna stake th-that son of a bitch."

"Right you are, luv. I'm all for a good tussle. Uh…" His brows narrow, considering an issue that hadn't crossed his mind until this moment. "Only one problem with the stakin' route."

"What?" she demands, confused.

"Might need a demonstration on this one, pet. Assume you've got an arsenal here somewhere?"

"My room," she nods. Still weak, but pushing through on the adrenaline that stems from an only daughter's love for her mother, Buffy guides Spike upstairs and pushes open her door.

"Top l-left drawer in the vanity," she nods, marching straight into her closet and snatching her pocket-ridden overalls and a tight long-sleeved shirt. "There's a cross in there, so be careful. There's also the trunk under m-my bed. T-turn around."

"Why do I need t–?"

Her back to him, Buffy starts peeling the bloodied white blouse over her head, and after one second of chin-dropped staring, Spike dutifully spins around on his heel out of long-embedded Victorian instinct.

"Good god, Buffy," he gasps. "Could've warned me."

"I did," she barks, her voice as cold as it'd been before his surprise gifts from the gas station convenience store.

He bites his lip and prays for willpower as she continues undressing. Fishing through the indicated drawer, Spike pulls out a knife, a stake, and a small bottle of holy water, his fingers blistering from accidental light contact with the cross in there as well.

"You decent yet, Buffy?"

"Yeah. Get my bag out from under the bed. Pack everything."

Choking back an, ' _As you wish, Slayer_ ,' he moves to her bed and finds the dark leather duffel, then starts stocking it with the contents of her trunk. He hands her the vial of holy water, which she shoves in the front pocket of her overalls.

"Just some crosses left down here. You'll have to get those. Don't fancy fightin' with my fingers crumblin' into ash."

Buckling the last snap on her outfit, Buffy elbows her way next to Spike and adds a large cross to the bag. She zips it up and heaves the massive thing onto her shoulder by the straining strap.

"Luv, that weighs more than you," Spike assesses, trying to get his hand under the handle to lift it off the petite girl. "Slayer, wait."

"What? Let's go. Let's kick his ass."

"I know you _want_ to, luv. Just thought you ought'a know if you _can_ before you go rushin' off. Will you just listen to me for ten seconds?"

"Fine." She lets the duffel clunk back onto the bed and faces him, arms crossed.

"A'right. Here... try."

"You want me to stake you?" Buffy asks in bewilderment as he holds up her usual wooden weapon with the point leveled at his chest.

"Won't hit the heart on this side. It's just to see if you can pierce deep enough in your condition, let alone jab this wood through my sturdy breastbone an' have any hope of dustin' nasty ol' Kralik."

She takes the stake from him, their fingers brushing, and swings it forward. He winces only slightly, the wooden tip nicking his skin but not even entering half an inch into his flesh.

"As I thought," Spike nods. "Gonna have to rely on somethin' other than stakin'. Holy water, p'haps a crossbow if we can lay hold of one."

"W… was there not one under the bed?" she asks, mumbling. _I'm helpless. Can't fight, can't stake… can't even keep my eyes dry_.

He kneels, spots the crossbow hidden under some plush animals, and adds it to the bag.

"Good call, luv, that'll help… Buffy? Love, what's the matter?"

"I'm sorry I hurt you," she sniffles, battling more tears as she gazes at the little pinprick of blood forming inside the latest hole in his t-shirt.

"It's nothin'... Though I might need a new shirt, what with all the holes bein' jabbed in this one."

"And… I'm scared. For M-Mom…"

His hands slide around her, drawing her against his chest, cool and comforting.

"I know, sweetheart. But we'll get there. You'll save her an' Watcher.... Maybe _not_ Watcher. Half a mind to bite him myself. But I won't, 'nless you… _Buffy_ …"

He gasps out her name as she kisses the cut the stake tip had made in his chest. His hands roam down her back to her waist, and he lifts her up for an eager, moaning kiss.

Again, Buffy's reminded of the stark contrast between Spike's brazen kisses and the almost reluctant ones Angel always bestowed, the later constantly afraid of his own demon nature crashing to the forefront, the part of him that wanted to bit and kill her, Angelus restrained only by the guilt of his soul.

But Spike isn't separated, compartmentalized in that way. He's _one being_ , a demon yet somehow with a human's heart and conscience still active, so wholly devoted to her that his clairvoyant sire was disgusted by him, by the very thought that he could love the Slayer.

"I'm s-so scared," Buffy breathes into his lips, arms around his neck, fingers in his cotton-soft hair.

"Not of _me_ , right, baby? I'd never hurt you now… never again."

"I know." She pulls back just enough to stare into his eyes. "I kn-know you won't… because you love me. Don't you?"

His gaze locks on her sparkling eyes, fearing they'll fill with disgust at any moment. "Yeah… I do. Buffy, I love you. I know I'll never be him, your first love. Never can forget the first. But… is there any chance?"

She pulls him close again and presses her lips to his, parting them and tracing her tongue against his mouth. Gasping again at her zeal, Spike leaves one hand supporting under her hips and twines the other through her hair. His kisses are life and fire and unobstructed, unchecked passion. He's an animal in all the right ways. Their foreheads clash as their mouths fuse, deeper, hungrier.

"My golden star," he groans between kisses. He shoves the leather bag aside and leans her back on the bed, pressing her against the mattress, barely conscious of what he's doing. "My sunshine... my Slayer..."

"Spike..."

The _want_ is there... the craving desire to feel his cool skin on every square inch of her body... but equally strong in her mind is the knowledge that somewhere in Sunnydale, her mom and Giles - who might be dead by now - are the hostages of an insane vampire.

"Spike..." she tries again to push words out around his passionate lips, to bring pause to their touches and the quickening of their breath.

"Buffy?"

"Spike... stop."

His head snaps back, breaking off their kiss, and then he pushes himself all the way off her and kneels at her bedside, panting. His brain also finally finds the moment it needs to catch up to his body's lust, and he's instantly mortified. _Even if she hadn't said 'stop', wouldn't be right, not now, not yet. Gotta save her mum, snuff Kralik, then get her back to full strength. Equals again._

"Buffy." Spike looks up and finds the girl's perplexed face. "I'm so sorry, luv. Wasn't thinkin'."

"You stopped," she whispers, a slight tilt to her head, surprised.

"Well, yeah, 'course I did. Lady calls things off… a real man obeys. Still got a bit of the Victorian gent tucked away inside my head."

"You're… not mad?"

" 'Course not. I want you. You want me. But we're heroes, gotta put the whole ruddy world before what we want." He quirks his eyebrows suddenly and chuckles. "Just called myself a hero. What's the world comin' to."

Standing, he helps her up and draws her into a cuddling embrace for just a second.

"Thank you, Spike."

"Of course, precious. Better get a coat. And don't you normally put up your hair for slayin'?"

"Sometimes."

"Here, let me."

She hands him some hair pins, and in a few quick motions, he coils her tresses into a French twist and secures it in place. He bends close and plants a soft kiss to her brow before hefting the bag of weapons onto his shoulder.

"Right. Let's go kill 'im."

* * *

_You take away..._

_You take away..._

* * *

The boardinghouse seems empty when they arrive, but of course with the windows bricked up, it's impossible to tell. Spike pushes open the front door, and Buffy steps in after him, crossbow armed. She draws a stake out of the duffel and sets it in the doorframe, preserving their escape route and letting in the faintest amount of light from the street.

"Spike, I can't see."

"I know. Bloody pitch black in here," he whispers back. _And the scent of so much blood it's hard to suss out any details in this place_. "Two heartbeats b'sides yours. Not sure where."

He pulls out his lighter from the depths of his pockets and clicks it to life, waving the tiny flame around so they can get some sense of their bearings, then quickly stows it away so he can have both hands free for fighting. Raising her crossbow, Buffy walks further into the parlor, almost on tiptoe, Spike prowling at her side and trying to sort through the assault on his heightened senses. Shadows crisscross the walls and floors, and the old building creaks with the slightest wind. A slow flicker remains in the fireplace, barely more than embers, no glow to light the room.

"Breathe, luv," Spike reminds her, and Buffy takes a shaky, hiccup-like little gasp, her fear compressing tightly on her chest. "There's a door on your left."

Cautiously, she takes hold of the handle, gives it a sharp twist, and yanks it open, only to be faced with a brick wall.

"Dammit," murmurs Spike. "Bloody maze."

"Giles knew about this," she mouths, searching for the glint of his blue eyes, an anchor point in the darkness. "He let them set this up… to try to kill me."

"Pro'ly had his job threatened, had no choice. Regrettin' it now, I imagine."

_CLANG!_

The latch on the front door echoes loudly, and the two of them whip around, now encased in darkness so deep that even the vampire feels blinded.

"Spike…"

"I'm behind your right shoulder, luv." He sets the duffel down on a couch, takes out a stake, and draws his switchblade from his duster. "Vamp just outside the front door. Think it's the fledge, pulled the doorstop away."

"Is th-there another door?"

"Dunno. I… there's a lot of blood, luv. At least four scents. Thrownin' me off."

As they creep back into the foyer, Spike blinks repeatedly, trying to clear his senses. They head for the front door, and Buffy jiggles the handle.

"It's jammed. Spi–"

With a horrific growl, Blair jumps out from the blackness, his hands clenched into claws. He grabs Spike by his leather-clad shoulders and flips him out of the way, sending the blond crashing through the door to the kitchen. Choking down a scream, Buffy aims the crossbow and fires… only for the bolt to sail over the demon's head. He grins wickedly and jerks the bow out of her hands, then seizes Buffy by the throat, lifts her off her feet and shakes her. His nails squeeze hard into her fragile neck, and her lungs fill with the stench of blood reeking off the freshly turned vampire.

Fighting his strangling hand, she kicks out, her boot hitting his shin hard. Blair snarls and loosens his hand just enough to let her wriggle free. Buffy dashes back into the sitting room, groping in the darkness for the duffel and followed in close pursuit by the enraged monster. He jumps on the sofa, blocking her, and she scrambles away, unable to reach the weapons.

Instead, she runs to the side of a bookshelf and shoves at it. A leather whirlwind joins her, and soon the shelf comes crashing down onto the charging vampire minion, its contents shattering and banging on the floor.

"Sp… Sp…" Buffy gasps out, chest and throat heaving, terrified by her own helplessness. He finds her hand, and realizes with surprise that his own is shaking just as badly.

"We got him, luv. It's a'right. Two on one now. Bastard's got no chance."

"I… the weapons…"

They step back to the couch and dig through the duffel, Buffy grabbing a cross, Spike restocking his pockets with stakes.

Then, from underneath the rubble of the bookshelf, a stringy pale hand with bloodied nails emerges and grasps Buffy's ankle.

"Spike!" she screams and kicks as she's knocked to the ground.

He grabs at the fireplace tongs and bludgeons Blair's head, again and again, but the fledgling hangs on with a vice-like grip despite half his face looking like ground beef. Roaring, Spike drives the poker point down, skewering it through the monster's skull, and at last Buffy breaks free and runs for the hallway, the half-empty duffel in her hands.

"Buffy! Wait!"

" _Hide and seek…_ "

Eyes wide, she turns in a wary circle as a much nearer voice than Spike's now grates on her ears, gravelly and vicious, the whisper impossible to place.

" _Hide and seek…_ "

She steps across the broken kitchen doorway, her heart rate thundering heavily in her own ears, beating on the insides of her eardrums. Against the far wall is a coffin-like box, the door closed and seemingly locked. Buffy steps closer, stake raised out of habit, hoping futilely that her strength and adrenaline will somehow kick in if she's called upon to use it.

The coffin door swings open with a _bang_ , and from within Kralik leaps on her, eyes amber and maniacal. He clenches her scratched neck in one hand and wrist in the other, shaking her hand violently until she drops the stake.

"Why did you come to the dark of the woods… to bring all these sweets to grandmother's house?" he smiles, tugging at her duffel and inspecting the contents, chuckling. He yanks it off her shoulder, tosses it aside, and snaps his jaws at her, his yellow teeth bared.

Then he recoils with a cat-like hiss, Buffy's straightened arm trembling badly but holding a large cross between them.

Kralik stares for a moment, smiles crookedly, and suddenly seizes her wrist, pressing the cross against his chest between the partially unzipped front of his jumpsuit. His face lights up with deviant sexual glee.

"Oh-oh, no no, just a little lower," he cackles, holding tight to her hand so she can't pull away. He forces the cross toward his stomach, steam issuing where the wooden symbol meets pale flesh. "Right… oh yes. Yes. Oh. Oooh! Thank you very much…"

Pulling free of the repulsive vampire, she leaves the cross in his hand and runs for the stairs, but collides with a dark shape and screams at the top of her lungs.

"It's me! It's me!" gasps Spike, wheeling her behind him as Kralik races toward them. Putting his whole body behind his punch, Spike clouts the insane vampire in the face and then runs with Buffy toward another door.

They plunge into the small side room and slam the door behind them, and Spike feels the wall for a light switch, the unmistakable texture of blood on the surfaces he touches. He finally finds it and illuminates the room, and Buffy bites back a scream, ducking her face into Spike's chest, trying to blot out the sight of the two mangled bodies on the table.

* * *

_You take away…_

_You take away…_

* * *

"Shh, shh. It's not... not Mum or Watcher, pet," he whispers soothingly, stroking her back and hair. "Think it might be the blokes who brought Kralik here. Look like stodgy types."

"Oh g-god… s-so much blood…"

"Their 'perfectly controlled test' seems to have gone all to hell rather impressively, hasn't it?" he murmurs to the corpses of Hobson and Travers, the slightest bit of pity in his voice. _They didn't know what they had on their hands. Might as well have stuffed Angelus in a box an' expected him to play nice an' do as he was told_. _Fools_.

The door at Spike's back creaks, Kralik's fists pounding at it, the insane vampire snarling and growling.

"Weapons?" demands Spike. He notices her scratched neck, but the nail cuts are shallow, barely pricks in her skin.

Buffy shakes her head and runs for a set of drawers in the room, fumbling through it for anything they can use, but she finds nothing.

Then, to both of their surprise, the hammering on the door stops, and after a few tense moments Spike slowly pries it open, staring out into the dim foyer.

"Can't see him…"

Her breathing shallow and hitching oddly, she follows Spike out of the blood-soaked room, and they look across to the stairs, suspecting a trap. He makes eye contact with Buffy, points to his own chest, and then steps forward into the center of the foyer, facing the stairs.

They wait, second after brutal second, peering around warily but finding nothing, so Spike looks at Buffy over his shoulder, puts a finger to his lips, and beckons her to join him. Slowly, they mount the stairs, Spike in front but constantly turning around to check the foyer again.

With a sudden smash from beneath them, Kralik's hand bursts through the side rails and clamps on Buffy's ankle. Screaming, she falls face-forward and bangs her forehead on a rung, blood splattering her face, her vision bursting white then dark.

Spike wheels around to help her, only for Kralik's other hand to clench a handful of his duster and yank hard. It pulls him off-balance, and he tumbles past Buffy down the stairs, landing on his leg with a sick _crunch_ and a "Hell!" barked out through gritted teeth. Kralik seizes Buffy's calf again and tugs her down several more steps until she rips a small slat out of the railing and stabs at his exposed arm. His hand retracts into the darkness, letting her scramble free and charge up to the top, mopping her bleeding head with her long sleeves.

At the upstairs landing, she fumbles at the nearest doorknob in the abandoned hallway. When it refuses to open, she races to the next one, and it yields. Buffy rushes inside and slams it, enclosing herself in utter, impermeable darkness. Her shaking hands flail through the black air.

At last her fingers contact a dangling pull-string and tugs, and the single light bulb clicks on… but she almost wishes it hadn't. Every bit of the walls is papered with polaroid photos of her mother and Giles, gagged and tied in chairs, their faces in various stages of horror. She pulls one off and shudders, but pays closer attention to it, hoping clues will pop out to her. In the corner of the image is clearly an antique water heater. _The basement!_

_BANG!_ Kralik's fist plows straight through the wooden door and gropes around for the handle. Buffy bolts for the only other door in the room, dashing out into the long hallway, the stairs on one end, a laundry chute on the other.

"Buffy!"

Spike limps up the last few steps and staggers to her, his jaw tightly clenched in pain.

"They're in the basement!" gasps Buffy, holding up the photo she'd scavenged.

Before Spike can take a good look, Kralik reappears from the room of pictures, blocking their return route to the stairs. " _If you stray from the path, you will lose your way,_ " he taunts in a sing-song voice, then changes to a recognizable tune. " _Bloody Will came up the hill, a-hunting little Slayers..."_

Stepping in front of Buffy, Spike charges with a roar, but Kralik shoves him into the wall and kicks his broken leg. Spike crumples, yelping in pain, but the beast's yellow eyes remain glued to Buffy.

Her eyes streaming, Buffy backs away as Kralik abandons Spike on the floor and approaches her with slow, predatory steps, his hand reaching for her cheek. She whimpers and struggles, but her squirming is no more effective than that of any other powerless ninety-pound girl.

"I won't take it all," Kralik murmurs, softening his voice as if trying to be dulcet. Lifting his other hand to her throat, he bends her head back and licks his lips as he pulls her close, his eyes on the scratches Blair had inflicted on her neck. "I won't take it all… Maybe I'll even leave some for Bloody Will, here..."

"NO!"

At first, Buffy thinks that somehow Spike's desperate yell has jarred something in Kralik's depraved brain. The crazy vampire's head rears back, his screams echoing off the hall, and he pushes Buffy away and fumbles in his jumper pocket for a little container of red pills. He tries to open it, but his fingers shake too violently, giving Spike time to hobble back to his feet and punch the lunatic in the middle of his back. In the same moment, Buffy rushes forward, snatches the pills, and then dashes away.

"Go, luv! Go!"

She dives head-first into the laundry chute opening, leaving Spike grappling desperately with Kralik.

* * *

_YOU TAKE AWAY…_

_YOU TAKE AWAY…_

* * *

The frenzied screams of the vicious monster follow her down the chute, and she lands on a rickety table, shattering it into splinters. She tries to rise on her trembling knees and arms, her head still bleeding, dust clouds smothering her.

"Buffy?"

_Mommy?_

Barely daring to believe her ears, Buffy lifts her head and then gasps with joy. She stumbles up to her feet, rushes to her mother's side, and yanks the gag away from her mouth. "Mom…"

"Oh Buffy, we have to get out…"

"I know, Mom. I know. W-we'll be okay now."

Behind Joyce is Giles, also strapped to a chair and gagged, his eyes awash with sorrow and guilt as he meets Buffy's gaze. But she doesn't have time for accusations now. She rips at the ropes binding Joyce's hands, but they're too strong for her, and a sudden hammering beats against the basement door. Buffy gazes around in a panic, the pill bottle still clenched in her hand. There's nothing nearby but a rickety table with a polaroid camera and a glass of water...

Kralik shoves Spike down the stairs, the blond tumbling and rolling until he smashes to the floor by the splintered piece of furniture, bleeding copiously. The maniac comes running down into the basement and kicks Spike's partially limp form out of the way, his demonic face even more enraged than Buffy would have thought possible,.

"Where are they?! WHERE ARE THEY?!"

He grabs Buffy by the shoulders and shakes her until she drops the pill bottle into his snatching hand. Ripping off the top, he pours at least a dozen red pills into his mouth, shoves Buffy to the ground near Spike, and flails for the glass of water by his camera. Kralik gulps and swallows, then gasps for air as the hemoglobin pills start to stabilize him.

He turns back toward Buffy, his psychotic grin back in place, watching her crawl backwards, Spike sitting up weakly at her side.

"Well, kids, this has been a merry, merry chase," Kralik growls, advancing even closer. "But it's suppertime for one, little mouthful of a Slayer..."

He stops... manages one more step forward, and halts again, his shoulders twitching with sudden pain. He glances from the pills in his right hand to the empty glass in his left, and then his eyes rove back to Buffy.

"Oh, my… what have you…? My pills…"

Slayer strength in her eyes, she silently lifts the tiny bottle inscibed with the words 'Holy Water' out of the chest pocket of her overalls.

"No!" Shaking and shouting in pain, Kralik drops the telltale glass as steam sizzles from his every orifice. "No! Nooo!"

"If I was at full Slayer power, I'd be punning right about now," mutters Buffy coolly.

"NOOO!"

Burned to ash from the inside out, Kralik disintegrates with a final ear-piercing scream.

Buffy stares at the spot where his remains decorate the floor – barely believing the battle is over – and then slumps against Spike, who hugs her tightly, panting with equal relief.

"Buffy?" whispers Joyce, watching in astonishment as her daughter quickly pockets the bottle and wraps her arms around the battered vampire, returning his embrace. The girl smiles wearily, enough to make her mother realize that in the arms of this man she is loved and comforted, no matter his past or his supposed lack of a soul and human feelings.

"We're coming, Mom."

Giles makes a noise behind his gag, presumably asking who is with Buffy. The two blonds hurry over, and Spike applies his switchblade to the knots around the two captives' wrists.

"Oh, Buffy, thank God you're okay," says Mrs. Summers with a shudder. "Ohh, that man…"

"It's okay. We're okay."

Standing at last, Giles turns around, and his mouth falls open in a gasp of horror at the sight of Spike. "You!" He overturns the chair he'd been bound to, wrenches off a leg, and charges, but Buffy throws herself in the way, her hands over Spike's heart.

"Giles, no!" she screams, clutching Spike tightly even as he tries to move her into a protective position between himself and the frantic Watcher. He stares between them, utterly flabbergasted by her words and the vampire's motions.

"You… _you_ saved her?"

" 'Lo, Watcher. Poisoned any birthday girls lately?" asks Spike, not even pretending to be subtle in front of Mrs. Summers. Joyce turns to the older man in bewilderment.

"Rupert?"

Giles blushes with shame. "Joyce..."

Suddenly, another growling form hurtles toward them from the stairwell and shoves Spike and Buffy to the ground. Moaning and foaming at the mouth, Blair lumbers unevenly toward Joyce, the bloody poker still sticking through the creature's grotesque head.

Giles throws himself on the beast and wrestles him to the ground. Blair punches at the Watcher's face and stomach, but with a sharp plunge, Rupert drives the chair leg through the vampire's chest, adding his ashes to those of Kralik.

Slowly, the Watcher raises his eyes and meets those of Buffy and Spike, who silently offers him a hand and pulls his to his feet. Almost too exhausted to feel any relief, the four of them mount the stairs – Joyce being helped by Giles, Buffy cradled in Spike's arms, his leg healing quickly through his vampire vigor.

"Where to, Watcher-mine?" Buffy mumbles, her sweating and bleeding forehead mitigated by the coolness of Spike's neck.

"The library," murmurs Giles. "I… I have an antidote… and a great deal to explain."

_To be continued_...


	10. Who Watches the Watchers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter includes quotes from "Helpless" and from "Bad Girls".

Chapter 10: Who Watches the Watchers?

During their long walk to the school library, Giles guiltily confesses everything – the Cruciamentum, the mixture of drugs that had rendered Buffy powerless, and the conversation he'd had with Travers the day before the Council Director's death, in which he'd pleaded that the planned test went beyond all protocol and that any reasonable Watcher would never subject his Slayer to such a thing. The whole time, Joyce's scowl grows increasingly severe, and eventually she releases Giles's arm completely and walks on the other side of the vampire, arms crossed reprovingly.

"Thought it was a barmy plan the moment I heard Kralik was in on it," mutters Spike to the three exhausted humans. "Would you believe in my early years these tweedy blokes came up to me an' actually tried to bargain _me_ into bein' the Slayer's challenge? Must've really hated the poor girl. I refused a'course. No vampire with any shred of dignity would agree to fight a weakened Slayer. Got plenty of humans to nibble on if you don't care 'bout the glory of the fight."

"Oh," Buffy realizes glumly as Giles unlocks the side door into the library, and Spike carries her inside, "I left my weapons. The whole bag of them."

"We'll go back for 'em tomorrow night if you'd like, luv," Spike reassures her. "Got to patch you all up first. Watcher!"

Giles jumps a little at the vampire barking out his title. "What?"

"Brew Mum some coffee, half-strength. Calms the nerves. _An' chances are it'll make her less pissed off at you_ ," he adds the last phrase in a hissing whisper.

"Oh. Oh, of course. Quite right."

"Then you've got a bit of a patch job to do yourself, once you dig up the antidote you promised," the vampire nods at Giles's partially scabbed neck wound and facial bruises. "Where do you keep the first aid kit 'round here? You have _got_ one, haven't you?"

"In my office. I'll unlock it in a moment," he replies, guiding Joyce into a nearby chair, while Spike bears Buffy a little farther away and sets her down by the table near the racks of books.

"Here, luv. I'll scrounge up some bandages for you. Awful good at scroungin', aren't I?"

"The best," she smiles weakly, then shudders and refuses to let go of his hand. "I c-can't believe we beat Kralik and then almost got our throats ripped out by his _fledge_."

Spike kneels beside Buffy's chair, his thumb gently caressing the back of her hand. "Yeah, that was my fault, luv. Should've wrenched his head clean off 'stead of just stabbin' it. I lost track of where you were an' got myself all turned 'round. Haven't been so scared witless in God only knows how long."

"Bloody maze," she whispers in a fairly decent imitation of his accent. Spike chuckles, slipping her hair pins out so that her golden tresses coil softly around her face.

"Couldn't say it better myself. Little genius, you are, you know? Trickin' Kralik into knockin' back that holy water."

" _You_ gave me the bottle, remember? You got it out of my desk drawer."

"But _you_ put it to proper use. If that doesn't show those Council wankers with their fancy clipboards that you're the best Slayer they've ever been lucky enough to have, then I can't imagine what would."

"Heroes," Buffy murmurs, remembering another piece of their hushed and frantic conversation only a few hours ago. "Both of us."

"That's right, my love."

He leans in – intending to bestow just a little brush to her lips – but when his mouth meets hers, Buffy sits straighter in her chair and reaches around his neck to pull him closer, prolonging and deepening the kiss for just another second.

"Mmm… darling, lemme fetch those bandages now, a'right? Smell a little too tasty for proper snoggin'."

"Why can't you just fix it, like you did with my hand?"

Spike glances quickly at Giles before giving Buffy's cheek a feather-soft kiss. "It's not that I'm not tempted," he reassures her, "just don't think Watcher'd approve of me goin' all golden-eyed. Awful lot of conclusions for him to jump to. An' plus, I don't reckon it'd be wise to scare poor Mum anymore tonight."

"That's…" she starts to disagree, but then closes her mouth in a pout and mumbles, "actually a bunch of good points, but… still, it'd be way faster. Hey, Giles!"

Giles starts again at her suddenly raised voice and nearly drops the mug of coffee he'd prepared for Buffy's mother. "Yes, Buffy?"

"Spike's gonna do his vamp thing and heal up my forehead, okay? Mom, don't be scared. It's just Spike."

Already fatigued from the night's long ordeal, Joyce just nods and wipes her grime-streaked forehead with one hand.

"I-I'm sorry, what are you talking about?" Rupert asks, cautiously handing Mrs. Summers her cup before strolling over to where Spike stands next to Buffy.

"Just show him," Buffy shrugs to the blond, and then to her Watcher, "And don't attack him or anything. He's done this before. He's under control." _Angel never had this kind of control over his demon. He used to turn bumpy all the time, completely by accident, fighting or kissing. But not Spike_.

His gaze carefully fixed on Giles, Spike lets his forehead gradually furrow into bony ridges, his eyes turn amber-gold, and his fangs prickle inside his closed mouth.

"Buffy, what is the meaning of this?" Giles demands, his hand twitching to his back pocket, but of course finding nothing, his cross and stake taken away at his time of capture.

"Calm down. He's healing my cut. Just watch. Spike…"

The vampire slowly circles around Buffy's chair, lifts her hair up from her forehead, and lowers his mouth to the gash she'd received when falling on the stairs. Tenderly, he caresses her cut, his tongue lapping away the drops of blood that have already oozed down toward her eyebrow, and then seals the gash completely with one final swipe and a kiss as he transforms back to his human face.

"Incredible," murmurs Giles, stepping forward to inspect Buffy's head. Spike moves discreetly behind her chair, his jeans uncomfortably tight from the blood's aphrodisiac effects.

_Won't need a drink for a week after that. Strong stuff, Slayer blood_.

"Buffy, this… good lord, this looks like it's been healing for days," Giles stammers, completing his scrutiny of the girl's face, a tired smile spreading across it. "This is simply extraordinary. Why did Angel never tell us of this benefit?"

"'Cause my poof of a grandsire doesn't have the self-control to do somethin' like that," Spike replies, not caring whether the Watcher's comment was addressed to himself or to Buffy. "Soul or not, he's got a black an' white view of the world. Never stops to think that somethin' supposed to be evil could be used for good. 'Sides…" He runs his fingertips along Buffy's sleeved shoulder, and she smiles up at him, "blood like hers… gotta have a certain kind of strength to resist takin' any more than the necessary to heal her up."

"However did you discover this?" demands Giles. _What a fascinating addition to the Watchers' Diaries this will make… oh… but of course… I imagine my firing is still in effect_ …

"I, um… used to heal Dru," Spike shrugs, a melancholic tone coloring his voice. "Always gettin' herself hurt some way or another. We heal faster than humans right off, but… did what I could, you know? For the one I loved… Er, anyhow, discovered it fixed up humans as well. Slayer an' I happened to cross paths the other night, her knuckles got all scratched up, and I tried it out. Worked a'right, eh, luv?"

Buffy squeezes his hand, thankful for Giles's calm, even enthusiastic reaction. Spike grins back at her, rubbing her shoulder with his other fingers.

"I'll… yes, well, Buffy, would you like some tea?" asks the Watcher, noting the tender exchange between the former enemies. "And I'll see about that antidote."

"Yes, please."

"An' that med kit as well? Got anythin' to sooth that bruise of hers?" Spike inquires, following Giles into the librarian's office.

"Yes, quite… um…" Giles pauses, his hands half-full of tea ingredients from the cupboard under his office desk, then faces Spike with the exact expression of a disapproving father figure.

"What?" mumbles the vamp.

"I assume, _William_ , that there's a perfectly legitimate reason why you are not only back in this town, but apparently on very good terms with my Slayer?"

"Uh… well, I… er… I reckon she an' her mates told you 'bout what happened when I swung through town before Christmas?"

"They did. They had the impression you intended to return to South America."

"Well, I did… an' I was on my way out of the States, but… somethin' stopped me."

"Do you recall what precisely it was?"

"Wasn't anythin' _precisely_ , Watcher. Just… thinkin' 'bout Buffy, an' my poof of a grandsire… and all the ways he could hurt her… an' it made me sick and scared, more than I'd felt in a century. Can't describe it, really. Wasn't sure whether I wanted to fight her or fall at her feet an' worship her."

"That will suffice," Giles nods, unearthing the antidote from the depths of his briefcase. _Firing be damned. This is remarkable. A vampire without a soul, but with clearly expressed human emotions and the ability to love, most certainly a fact that should be recorded in the Archives_. "So you returned to Sunnydale?"

"Yeah. Stopped somewhere along the way, drove back, an' found her gettin' attacked by Kralik an' his troll of a fledge right along Crawford Street."

"Crawford Street?" asks Giles with a shred of recognition, handing Spike the two antidote pills and the medical kit from his desk. "Isn't that where –"

"Forehead's poncy mansion, yeah. Did I mention she broke it off with the bugger? Realized he was a danger to her. Couldn't trust him to be near her, considerin' her state."

"And you've been with her since then? Protecting her for nearly two days?"

"I have."

"Simply incredible. Travers – the, erm, _former_ director of the Council – was somehow under the impression that _you_ had killed Buffy. He gave out the Watcher's code Rong-Wood, in reference to your prior Slayer victims."

"Didn't know I had my own code," smirks Spike. "Kralik pro'ly saw me carryin' Buffy off to safety, presumed what he liked 'bout it, then used it as part of torturin' ol' Travers."

"And us," Giles whispers with a glance over at Joyce. "Kralik insisted that Buffy's life and virtue rested in your hands. Such uncouth things that creature said…"

"I didn't lay a finger of harm on her, Watcher. I swear. Wouldn't hurt this girl even if it'd cost me my life."

"That's… well, quite commendable of you. I have to admit, I'm impressed."

"Aw, right sweet of you, Watcher. Hear that, luv?" Spike grins, strolling back over to Buffy with only the slightest limp in his damaged leg, Slayer blood rapidly working to finish its healing. "Giles actually complemented me. Is hell freezin' over or what?"

"That's crazy. Giles, have _you_ been taking any funny potions too?" asks Buffy bitterly.

Rightly reprimanded, Giles hangs his head. "Buffy, I'm so terribly…"

"Good gracious!" exclaims a very British voice in the doorway of the library.

Two men in matching tweed suits – one with salt-and-pepper hair, the other brown-haired and considerably younger – stand a few paces behind Joyce's chair, both of them flabbergasted to see Buffy sitting at the table. Spike moves warily to situate himself directly beside her, slips the two little tablets into Buffy's outstretched palm and sets the first aid kit on the table to free up his hands.

"Mates of yours?" he asks Giles, his voice cool with just a hint of a growl.

"Colleagues," replies Giles, stepping out of his office with his spare set of spectacles in hand. "Gentlemen. I didn't know to expect you tonight."

"Yes, well." The elder of the newcomers clears his throat dismissively, as if he's a man accustomed to being 'expected' at any and all hours of the night. "We've just had a very trying ten-hour flight, Rupert. No mollycoddling, if you please. This is not the state of things we expected, given the information we received. Our surveillance of the boarding house was compromised, but our last contact with Director Travers indicated–"

"Then you might not be aware that Kralik killed Hobson and Travers and made Blair one of his own," Giles interrupts, carrying over the cup of tea he'd prepared for the girl and then standing on her other side, mirroring Spike. "Buffy was able to defeat him, exhibiting extraordinary courage and clear-headedness in battle. By any reasonable assessment, she passed the test, as ruthless and unfair as it was."

"We're not in the business of 'fair', Rupert, as you're well aware. We're fighting a war."

"You're _waging_ a war. _She's_ fighting it. There's a difference."

"If you informed her of the nature of the Cruciamentum, the test is invalid," interjects the younger Watcher. He's well-groomed and tailored, slightly foppish.

"I say it got invalid the moment that monster got loose and came after my _mother_ ," Buffy glares at the two tweed-attired intruders, Spike looking equally venomous at her side. "I think you'd better turn around and get out of town before I get my strength back."

"Yes, Rupert, who are these men?" Mrs. Summers demands, standing up with her mug of tea in her hands and joining Giles on Buffy's right. "What do they have to do with my daughter being missing and that dreadful monster?"

"Mr. Roger Wyndam-Pryce and his son, Wesley," says Giles. "They're members of the Watcher's Council. Gentlemen, this is Joyce Summers, Buffy's mother. She's aware of Buffy's calling as the Slayer."

"Most unusual," comments the younger Watcher, Wesley.

"Regardless," his father says dismissively, "if what you say is true regarding Kralik's defeat, then yes, Miss Summers has passed. However, the Slayer is not the only one who must perform in this situation. In a prior communication, late Director Travers recommended to the Council that you be relieved of your duties as Watcher immediately, and as the new Director, I agree." Roger Wyndam-Pryce turns to Giles, his impassive expression turning slightly snide. "You're fired."

"On what grounds?" Giles demands.

"He indicated your affection for your charge has rendered you incapable of clear and impartial judgment. You have a father's love for the child, and that is useless to the cause. It would be best if you had no further contact with the Slayer."

"I'm not going anywhere," retorts Giles, almost threateningly. Briefly smiling at him, Buffy slips the two pills of antidote into her mouth and swallows them down with a gulp of tea.

"No, well, I didn't expect you would adhere to that," says the elder Mr. Wyndam-Pryce. "At any rate, Wesley here will assume the role of Watcher for both Miss Lehane and, it seems, Miss Summers. If you interfere or countermand his authority in any way, you will be dealt with. Are we clear?"

"Oh, we're very clear," Giles grumbles.

Roger Wyndam-Pryce turns to go, nodding his head briefly to Buffy. "Congratulations again."

She simply glares. "Bite me."

The new Director of the Watcher's Council gives a small derisive chuckle at her brazenness, continuing to move towards the door. "Mm, yes, well. Wesley will make the necessary arrangements to receive all of Mr. Giles's records and familiarize himself with Miss Summers and Miss Lehane tomorrow."

Wesley regards them all with a nervous smile as the library door swings shut behind his father.

"Uh… well, yes, training procedures have been updated quite a bit since your day," he says to Giles, probably not intending it to come across so derogatory. "Much greater emphasis on field work."

"Really?" Giles asks, sarcasm oozing from his tone.

"Oh, yes. It's not all books and theory nowadays. I have in fact faced two vampires. Under controlled circumstances, of course."

Spike gives a little snort of condescension, and then whispers in the back of Buffy's ear. " _Little nancy boy, hangin' onto daddy's coattails. Prob'ly still wears nappies in case he pisses himself at the sight of a real vampire_."

Buffy snorts a laugh, but at Giles's small stern look, she quiets herself.

"And who are _you_?" demands Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, scowling peevishly at Spike.

The blond's brows twitch mischievously. "You haven't heard of me? Cripes, they've sure been slackin' off in Watcher school since they churned you out, eh, Rupert?"

"Mr. Giles, who is this man?" demands the young Watcher.

Giles positively grins. "This _man_ is the reason Buffy Summers is alive, despite the horrific circumstances that you, your father, and Travers arranged with absolutely no knowledge of the situation's true danger."

"A rogue demon hunter?" Wesley speculates excitedly.

"Hardly, until now." Giles turns to Spike, growing a little tired of all the introductions. "Perhaps a demonstration?"

Spike smirks – sexy and sinister – and with a single, smooth roll of his neck, he dons his demon face and bares his protracted fangs, snarling.

Wesley shrieks so loudly that the spoon rattles on Mrs. Summers's tea saucer, and he scrambles backwards away from Spike until he thumps into a bookcase.

"Controlled circumstances only, eh, Superiority Complex Jr.?" the vampire snorts, retracting his fangs and bony ridges with a second arching neck motion. "Brings your tally up to three vamps, then. Don't they have a cowardice test on you Watchers?"

"I… well, I… I see. Well, um... th-the boarding house," he turns to Giles, abruptly changing topic. "You are quite certain Hobson a-a-and Director Travers are deceased."

"There's no doubt," Giles replies. No matter Travers's stodgy attitude or his blind disregard for Buffy's safety, Giles could never have wished such an end on the former Director.

"Well. The, um, the inn shall be scrubbed, I imagine. Any evidence of the battle removed, and the alterations to the building structure returned to their original condition."

"My weapons," mumbles Buffy suddenly.

"Pardon?"

"I want my weapons back."

"Yes, well, we'll see what can be arranged," says Wesley dismissively. He turns to depart, but a growl from beside Buffy makes him gasp squeakily and wheel back around.

"The girl _said_ … she wants 'er duffel of weapons," Spike murmurs, his eyes sharp and venomous, but still blue, "so you bloody-well get it for 'er, Nancy Boy. Got it?"

"Ah. Yes. Yes, of course. Erm, Miss Summers, why don't you speak with Miss Lehane and–"

"It's _Buffy_ ," she corrects him, fairly tired of being addressed by her last name. Way too British. "And I'm pretty sure Faith will stake you if you call her _Miss Lehane_."

"I see. Well, um, Buffy, if you would please inform… uh, Faith, that I'll be meeting with both of you here on Monday."

"After class or before?"

"I'm sorry?" Wesley asks, bewildered once again.

"Do we have to come talk to you _before_ we go to class or _after_ school? What, did you think I just hung out at the Sunnydale High library for kicks?"

"Oh… after your lessons will do."

"Fine."

"Anything else?" asks the young Watcher, clearly intimidated by the combination of Giles and Spike flanking Buffy.

"Nope."

"Well… good night then, Mr. Giles. So pleasant to meet you, Mrs. Summers, Miss Sum– Buffy."

"Not gonna wish _me_ good night, then, little ponce?" Spike grins at Wesley's retreating back as the tenderfoot Watcher practically flees the library in the same direction as his father. "Cranky little buggers, aren't they?" he snorts to Giles. "Eh, Rupes, any way you can set it up so that Dandy Boy gets holed up in the most cockroach-ridden joint in this town? Poor lad's likely to run screamin' back to Merry Old in a day or two."

"A most excellent suggestion," Giles ponders.

Buffy reaches over and pokes his side, a small, sleepy smile on her lips. "Giles, you made a pun. Demonstration. Demon-stration. Did you do that on purpose?"

"I… well, no, actually, I didn't."

"Damn funny, though, once you think it through," nods Spike. "Well, Watcher, I think there're two young ladies here who deserve to turn in for the night. Got your car 'round back?"

"No, I'm afraid it's still at Buffy's house, where Joyce and I were kidnapped."

"We didn't see it, but then I guess we went in and out the back both times," shrugs Buffy, her head flopping over until it rests against Spike's side. He leans over and presses his lips to her brow, slides a hand underneath her legs, and hoists her up into a bridal carry again.

"When's that antidote gonna kick in, Watcher?" he asks.

"Spike, circumstances being as they are, perhaps addressing me by my former title is not –"

"Not gonna stop calling you 'Watcher', Watcher. Can't just break a Slayer-Watcher bond by handin' you a pink slip and shovin' a young upstart in your place. If it annoys you, call me 'Bloody Will' for all I care."

Buffy giggles sleepily, her head resting on Spike's shoulder, his cool throat soothing the bruises on her neck and cheek. "Hmm. Bloody Will."

"Best get this one to bed sharpish," he smiles tenderly. "The antidote, Watcher?"

"Oh, um, by tomorrow evening she should be completely recovered. The serum allows her muscle systems to release the toxin so it can be flushed from the body. Just remember to drink plenty of fluids, Buffy, mainly water and a sports drink to replenish salts."

"Right. Do you feel alright to walk home with us, Mrs. Summers?"

Neither human adult misses the change in Spike's tone as he bears Buffy over to Joyce – the lowbrow accent softening into something more elegant, a voice from another time.

"Oh… yes, I believe so," says Buffy's mother, smiling and standing up. She smoothes back her daughter's hair and whispers to her, "I like this one better than the last one, sweetie."

"Me too," murmurs Buffy, her arms around Spike's neck. _Because even when he was evil, love was the most important thing to him. Because he doesn't see me as a helpless little girl, even when I couldn't have fought him back._

_Whoa, whoa, whoa. Pause time for a sec. Did my mom just approve of Spike being my boyfriend?_ Is _Spike my boyfriend?_

"Somethin' goin' on in that little thinker of yours, luv?" smirks Spike as he follows Mrs. Summers towards the library door.

"Spike… are you… um, are you gonna stay in town?" She blushes a bit, ducking her glowing face against his neck. Spike grins.

"Gotta fetch my car from the impound lot 'fore I can go anywhere, don't I?"

"Well, yeah… but…"

"Buffy... you really think I'd duck outta Sunnyhell now, after all I've gone through to convince you I wasn't a smarmy git?" he smirks. "Face it, luv. Can't get rid of me now. So long as you want me…?" he trails off, brows quirking, slightly worried.

"Yep. You're stuck here."

Nearly asleep, she burrows a little closer into him as they step outside into the chilly January air.

_To be continued..._


	11. Normal Again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thank you to everyone who has read, given kudos, or left a comment. I appreciate all your responses!

Ch 11: Normal Again

_Bbrrring! Bbrrring!_

"I'll carve more stakes!" gasps Buffy, jolting awake in her room and almost rolling off her bed onto the floor. Joyce answers the upstairs phone – at least her daughter assumes so, since it stops ringing – and Buffy pulls a pastel sweater over her tank top before stumbling out into the hallway, in time to see Spike wheel around the corner at the bottom of the stairs, his platinum hair fluffed from sleeping on the cot in the basement.

"Cripes! Somebody hook a fog horn up to your telephone, Slayer? Heard the bloody thing from two floors down."

"Nuh-uh, there's two phones. One in Mom's room and one in the livi-i-i-i-ing room," yawns Buffy, clunking down the stairs one by one until she is close enough to slump against the vampire's cool chest. He's switched out his bloodied shirts for a wrinkled ivory button-up that had belonged to Buffy's dad, something she'd smuggled away after the divorce, hidden in the bottom of a drawer. It's loose on his sleek, toned body, but clean.

"Aw, lil' thing didn't get enough kip, did'cha?" Spike grins, his arms holding her up.

"Buffy too tired to brain," she mumbles.

"By god, you're adorable, Slayer…"

"Buffy, dear," Joyce calls, poking her head out of the master bedroom, her bathrobe on over her pajamas. "Pick up the phone, please. It's Mr. Giles."

Grumbling sourly, Buffy plods through the foyer and into the living room, flumps down in the desk chair, and snatches the phone. "Slayers'. I mean, Summers'."

"Buffy!" Giles pants, his voice oddly muffled, as though he has his hand cupped over the transmitter, or perhaps as though he's squished himself into a closet. "Thank heavens."

"What? What's wrong now?" she demands, his tone wresting a little more alertness out of her.

"I had to take him in. He had nowhere else to do. His father had already boarded a plane and checked out of the room by the time he returned to their hotel."

"Who?" she blinks bewilderedly, and Spike pads over to her on bare feet and hooks his arms around the back of her chair so he can reach her shoulders, his long fingers rubbing knots out of her tense neck.

" _Wesley Wyndam-Pryce is staying at my flat_ ," Giles hisses in a tone of utter terror.

Buffy says nothing for a few seconds, then bursts into unrestrained giggles and shoves the phone at Spike.

"Er… this is Bloody Will."

"Spike! Is the sun up yet? For god's sake, man, if you come over here this moment and bite this young upstart, I'll be eternally in your debt."

"Hear that, Slayer?" he smirks at Buffy. "Watcher's trying to bribe me to off his replacement. Seems that little pansy's already drivin' poor Rupes ravin' mad."

"There's more," says Giles, and Spike holds the phone up to Buffy's ear when she manages to get her giggling under control. "I remembered… I made such a dreadful mistake. They've probably been so terribly anxious."

"Who?"

"Willow, Xander, and the others. They were with me yesterday at the library, when the Council called under the impression Travers had given them, that Spike had killed you."

"And you _told_ them?" gasps Buffy. "Xander and Willow still think I'm dead? Who else?!"

"Cordelia, Oz, and Faith were also present," confesses her Watcher. "I realize now that discretion would have been the wiser course, but at the time we were all so shocked and grieving that–"

"No, I get that. I just wish you'd told me sooner," Buffy interrupts. "Poor Willow! I bet she didn't sleep all night! Get off the phone so I can call her."

"Oh, oh yes. But… this matter with Wesley…"

"We'll deal with Watcher Junior on Monday. Bye Giles!"

"But Buffy–"

"Poor poor Watcher," Spike chuckles as Buffy jabs the 'End' key and then starts punching in Willow's home number.

"Poor _Giles_? Poor _Willow_ and _Xander_! My best friends think I snuffed it! Giles can put up with the obnoxious Watcher-wannabe for a few days."

She sits up in the chair, chewing on her lip as she waits for an answer at the Rosenberg's house. Spike meanders over to the couch and flops onto his back, swinging an arm over his eyes to block the light.

"Weren't you just asleep?" Buffy asks, still anxiously listening for Willow's voice.

"Vamps are nocturnal, Slayer. My sleep cycle's been screwed over proper," he mumbles a grouchy reply. He pulls over a decorative pillow and puts that over his head instead.

Smirking, Buffy refocuses on the phone as a young female voice answers.

"Hello, you've reached the Rosenbergs'."

"Uh… Cordelia?" Buffy double-takes. "Why are you at Willow's house?"

"Oh, hi, Buffy. We're all here. Everybody's pretty upset that you're dead and all."

Buffy sincerely wishes she could see the look on Cordy's face as the irony of her last statement gets processed in her brain, because a second later, the cheerleader is squealing excitedly.

"Oh my god! Oh my god! You're not dead! _Hey_!" Her voice retreats, presumably leaving the phone as she rushes into another room to share the news. " _Hey! Buffy's not dead! She's on the phone, so she can't be dead. Unless of course she's a vampire. Oh god! What if she's a vampire_?!"

More scuffling sounds and other voices – Xander, Faith, and Willow most prominent among them – reach Buffy across the line, and then Cordelia has the phone again. "Buffy, are you a vampire?!" she shouts loudly enough to make Buffy hold the phone a good foot away from her ear.

"I'm not a vampire!"

"But you'd say that even if you _were_ a vampire!"

"Buffy?!" Willow somehow wrests the phone away from Cordy, and Buffy can tell from the scratchy quality of her words that she was probably crying through most of the night. "Buffy is it… is it r-really you? You're n-not dead?"

"Hi Wills. I'm okay. Really! I got rescued from the crazy vamp the Watchers brought in to fight me."

"What about Spike?" demands Xander, from the sound of it playing tug-of-war with Willow over the phone. "Buff, what happened? Giles got a call from the Council and said Spike killed you!"

"Hi Xand. No, Spike didn't kill me. The Council guys were wrong. Their boss-person Travers got captured instead of me," she tries to explain. "I'm fine. I killed Kralik."

Cheering erupts on the other end of the line, and Spike grumpily rolls over on the sofa, squishing the pillow over his ears to muffle the sounds of joyous crying and " _Oh my god you're alive!_ "s that are issuing from the phone.

"What are you guys all doing at Willow's anyway?" Buffy finally asks, shouting over the ruckus.

"We were gonna scour the town!" announces Xander.

" _They_ were gonna scour the town," Cordelia interrupts, and Buffy assumes they've either set the phone to speaker or are holding it in the middle of the group. " _I_ was just here because Willow kept crying and Faith wasn't helping her at all. And Oz was trying, but you know, sometimes it just takes a fellow girl to understand these things."

"Well, the rest of us were planning a big epic search of the entire town," Xander continues. "I had this whole gate-storming idea about us charging into the Sunnydale Arms and staking ol' Kralik… hey, how come the Watchers thought _Spike_ had killed you? He's not even in town anymore."

"Um…" Suddenly nervous, Buffy glances at the back of Spike's blond head before cupping her hand around the phone. "Spike is here... in town, I mean."

"Did you kill him too? Way to go, B!" says Faith excitedly. "Two vamps with one stake!"

"No, I didn't kill him," Buffy corrects her, and disappointed sighs emerge from the Scoobies. "Um… Wills, can I talk to just you for a sec?"

Muted mutterings echo in the background at the Rosenberg's house, and then they're cut off with the sound of a slamming door and Willow's subdued voice says, "Sure, Buffy. What's up? You're… you're really okay, right? Faith just said something really gross, like about you might be missing an arm. Major squick visuals."

"No, no. I'm okay. Giles even gave me an antidote, so my Slayer strength and stuff are supposed to start coming back later today. I just wanted to talk to you first… about… well, you see… I broke things off with Angel."

"Really? That's awesome!" Willow gushes, before realizing that her enthusiasm is a bit on the insensitive side. "Oh, I mean… that's so sad. Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm okay, Wills. You don't need to play the 'pretending to be sad with you' card. I knew there was only bad going down that route, so I left."

"Well, I mean, even if you knew it was the right thing to do – which it _is_ – you could still be sad about it, and that'd be okay too. Do you want me to bring over some ice cream and watch _Steel Magnolias_ or _Dirty Dancing_? Cordelia and Faith could come too if you want a big support-y group thing. Although, neither one of them is really good with the comfort."

"No, I… I actually… this may sound sudden and impulsive, but hear me out. I have a new boyfriend."

"You do?! Oh my gosh! Who?"

"He's a great guy, Wills. Kinda misunderstood, but you have to get to know him to see it." Buffy says, trying to drag it out while she determines how best to admit it. "He… well, first off, he knows I'm the Slayer, and he's totally okay with it. He spent my whole birthday with me and helped me not be scared about losing my powers. He even snuck out and bought me Lunchables when I mentioned that you and I were gonna eat them together while celebrating."

"Who is it?" asks Willow excitedly. "Is it Scott Hope? Did he ask you out again?"

"Who the bloody hell is _Scott Hope_?" Spike snarls, sitting bolt upright on the couch, blue eyes wide and predatory, the pillow flying halfway across the room.

"Shh!" Buffy hisses at him, covering the phone with her hand, but too late to hide the sound of Spike's yell.

"Buffy, who's there?" mumbles Willow, her brain already churning with suspicions.

"Uh, my new boyfriend."

Silence greets Buffy for several extra-long seconds.

"Um… he sounds kinda like Spike," says Willow.

Buffy gnaws on her lip, returning the moment of silence.

"Oh my god!" squeals Willow, flabbergasted and horrified. "You're dating Spike?! The bottle-in-face, drunken stupor, nearly-killed-me-and-Xander, evil vampire Spike?!"

"What happened to the 'hear me out' part?"

"B-but… _Spike_? He's a vampire, an _evil_ vampire. He _doesn't have a soul._ "

"He helped me defeat Angel last spring, and he didn't have a soul then."

"Yeah, well, b-but… that wasn't _dating_ him! That was saving the world with him."

"He saved my life, Wills. Kralik and one of the Watcher guards that he'd turned into a vampire had me cornered, and Spike fought them off and rescued me. The birthday stuff was true."

" _Spike_ did that?" Willow says skeptically.

"Yuh-huh. He helped me rescue Mom and Giles and kill Kralik. I know you and Xand are probably still mad about the kidnapping incident, but… he's changed. You just have to give him a chance."

Willow lets out a heavy sigh. "I mean… I'll _try_. I guess it's your life, Buffy. It's just… we all thought he _hated_ you… and it's so quick after Angel…"

"Spike isn't Angel, Willow. I… I went to see Angel the night before my birthday, and I suddenly realized how scared I was, to be around him and not have any powers. All I could think about was how much he could hurt me if he couldn't hold himself back. But with Spike… I thought at first he saved me just to hold me hostage, but he didn't. Angel might have played a mind-game like that, false sense of security stuff, but Spike was a perfect gentleman. He took care of me and fed me and just sat and talked with me so I wasn't so scared. He even figured out that it was the evil Watcher Crucia-test."

"This is _THE_ Spike, right?" Willow clarifies. "Not some other totally different person who just happens to be named Spike?"

"Nope. Same Spike. William the Bloody, or 'Bloody Will', as Kralik called him. Blond, British, wears black leather, calls everyone 'luv'. Willow, I know this must sound crazy, but... promise you'll give Spike a chance, okay?"

Willow sighs heavily again. "I guess I'll do my best. Do you, uh, want me to tell Xander and everybody else?"

"No, you can all come over if you want, and I'll tell them in person. I just wanted you to know first, being my best friend and all."

"Thanks, Buffy. Oz brought his van for the Great Buffy-Finding Quest, so we'll all be there in a couple minutes! Don't go anywhere! We'll see you soon!"

"Bye, Willow." Buffy replaces the phone in its cradle and hunkers down on the couch next to Spike, who peeks his head out from underneath the reclaimed pillow.

"Your chums givin' you the list of a hundred an' one reasons why I'm no good for you, pet?"

"Yup," she mumbles. "And that was just from mild-mouthed Willow. Once Xander and everybody else finds out… ugh…"

She sighs and sinks deeper into the couch cushions, tucking her hair behind her ears.

"Eh, they'll come 'round once they figure out I'm not plannin' on hurtin' anyone 'nless they try to hurt me first. So…" Spike murmurs, replacing the pillow over his head so his voice comes out slightly muffled, "who's this Scott Hope git that Red mentioned, an' how mad will you be if I kill 'im? Last lil' glint of evil before I retire."

"Ew! Don't say 'retire', it makes you sound so old. I know you're a two-hundred-year old vamp an' stuff, but –"

"Oi! I'm only a hundred and twenty-six."

Buffy rolls her eyes. "Anyhow, Scott is just a boy at school. I dated him for part of September, but he dumped me because I was too 'distracted'." She forms air quotes around the last word, even though Spike's eyes are covered. "And right before Homecoming too."

"Little poofter. Pro'ly swings for the other side. Ah, well. His loss, my gain."

Leaning over, Buffy lays the side of her head on Spike's firm chest and drums her fingertips on his arm.

"He wasn't the right kind of guy for me anyway. Normal flees from me like a chicken with its head lopped off, arms all flail-y."

"Ordinary isn't good enough for you, love, 'cause you're extraordinary. Got a callin', a destiny. Most folks spend their whole lifetimes tryin' to suss out what they're here on this planet to do with themselves. You got your shtick handed to you, an' all the blessings an' curses that go along with that."

"You were definitely a poet in another life," says Buffy idly, nuzzling her cheek against his borrowed shirt and smelling an odd combination of her dad's Old Spice and Spike's smoky musk.

Spike chuckles. "Watcher books tell you that? Think Rupert'd mind if I snuck in to the library some night an' pulled out a few pages. Not any important stuff, mind. Just the embarrassing bits. Oh god, they don't have excerpts, do they? Not that I know how in the bloody hell they'd get a'hold of those…"

"Uh… I was kidding," Buffy giggles. "Wait… you're serious? You _were_ a poet?"

"Oh, hell…"

Thankfully for Spike, they both hear the sound of Oz's van pulling up to the driveway at that exact moment, and Buffy pushes off from the couch and stares through the edge of the living room curtains, wringing her hands.

"That wasn't a couple minutes!" she gasps, watching the four Scoobies and Faith come pouring out of it and rush the front door. "Oh gosh! I haven't figured out what I'm gonna tell them… about being with you and also not being mad at Giles 'cuz it wasn't his fault, really. Oh, and the new Watcher guy!"

"I'll go in the kitchen, save you a couple extra moments for thinkin' out my bit," Spike nods. "My guess is, the little whelps will be so bleedin' happy to see you that nobody will have much to say on anythin' else for a while. Pretty sure there won't be room for me in the big soggy group hug."

He swings his long legs off the couch, gives her a fleeting but tender kiss, and strolls away into the Summers' kitchen. His blond head disappears around the corner just as the hammering on the front door starts, and Joyce rushes down the stairs to answer it.

"Buffy, why didn't you tell me you invited everyone over?"

"Sorry! I just called Willow," she explains, joining her mother at the door. "Giles told them all that I was–"

"Buffy!" four voices cry out, along with a "B!" exclaimed by Faith. And then – true to Spike's conjecture – she's enveloped in the arms of her friends, Xander and Willow first, with Oz and Faith patting everyone else on the backs, and Cordelia hurling herself onto Joyce for no reason at all.

"I knew she wasn't dead!" the cheerleader exclaims confidently. "The moment they called me and told me, I didn't believe them. It was only after Willow cried for, like, six hours that I really got scared and started thinking about all the demons and vampires that I totally would have been killed by if it wasn't for Buffy!"

"Wills! You didn't really cry for six hours, did you?" Buffy gasps, struggling and squirming out of their clutching embrace so she can grip the redhead by her upper arms and look into her red-rimmed eyes.

"M-m-maybe," confesses Willow, eyes threatening to overflow again. "You're my best friend, and I thought you were really g-gone! Not just _missing over the summer_ gone, _not alive anymore_ gone. A-and then we were afraid you might have even been turned into a vampire, and we knew that was your worst nightmare… and then we were afraid we might have to _stake_ you or something!"

Buffy hears the faintest muffled laughing from Spike in the kitchen, but is fairly certain her exuberant friends aren't listening enough to catch it.

"It's so good to see you, Buff," whispers Xander, hugging her around the shoulders again the moment she relaxes her hold on Willow. "What happened? Why did the Watchers think you were dead?"

"They brought this psychotic vamp, Kralik, here to challenge me, but he turned on them and kidnapped their boss, Travers, and tortured him and lied, saying I was dead."

"How did the Watchers find out?" asks Oz.

"Apparently he let Travers have a last phone call, kinda a 'screw you' to the Council. That must have been how they found out. I mean, the guy was crazy."

"Watcher types sound like total asses," snorts Faith, finally finding her spot to swoop in and wring Buffy's neck with a hug. "Glad you're still kicking, B. Mainly 'cuz I would have had to put up with these weepy losers all by myself. That would mega-suck."

"Gee, thanks, I feel so special. Um, well… there are a few more things I need to tell you."

"Strictly Scoobies-need-to-know basis stuff?" asks Faith, rolling her eyes as she strides away from the group and flopping down on the couch in almost the exact same spot as Spike, except instead of hiding her face under the pillow, she fluffs it under her shoulders and pulls out a stake and a knife to whittle it with.

"Um… actually you really need to hear some of this. Well… I guess the short version is… we have a new Watcher. Giles got fired."

"What?" gasp Xander, Willow, and Cordelia all at once, while Oz's brows twitch, the often-silent musician sharing in their shock, but not vocalizing it.

"What do you mean 'fired'?" demands Faith, pausing in her stake-sharpening. "I thought the Watcher stuff got passed down through families, like the Mafia. You can't get fired from a family business, can you?"

"Apparently the Watcher family business is fire-able," Buffy shrugs. "This tweedy father-and-son Watcher team from England showed up last night at the library and gave Giles the boot. And our new Watcher is gonna be the son, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce."

"Sounds starchy."

"Oh, wait 'till you see him. I think he and Cordy could trade tailoring tips."

"Hey!" Cordelia pouts. "Or, wait, was that a compliment?"

"Buffy, luv, I can't find the marshmallows!"

The foyer of 1630 Revello Drive falls utterly silent. One by one, Buffy's four closest friends turn to her with completely aghast expressions as they recognize the British vampire's voice coming from the kitchen.

"Buffy…" whispers Xander, momentarily forgetting that with his superior hearing, the vampire in the kitchen can still pick up on every word he utters, "please don't tell me that Spike the Slayer-slayer is in your house."

"Uh… well, yeah, he is," she admits with a little shrug. _Way to go, Spikey. So much for warming them up to the idea_.

"I've looked in the usual drawer by the coffee filters an' can't find 'em," Spike continues, a slightly cheeky tone in his voice.

He's still out of sight of the foyer, unseen by the Scoobies gathered in panic just inside the front door. Faith, however, gets a peek at him from her vantage point on the couch, and she smirks at Buffy, nodding approvingly. "Not sure who the hot blond in your kitchen is, B, but he is a _hunk_ ," she whispers, grinning. "Wouldn't mind taking that stallion on a long gallop."

"Faith!" Buffy gasps, her cheeks turning some hitherto unseen color between orange and puce.

"Yo, Mystery Dude!" Faith calls out in reply to Spike's question, still sharpening her stake idly. "I drank all the hot cocoa at Christmas, unless Mrs. S. got more!"

"Oh, bugger," Spike sighs, exaggeratedly disappointed. "Thanks anyways, pet. Buffy, luv, s'that the new junior Slayer I've been hearin' so much about?"

"It _is_ Spike!" Xander gasps, turning around and yanking open the door. "Nobody move! We've got tons of weapons in the van. Oz, come on!"

"Xand, stop, you don't need weapons!" shouts Buffy.

"Hold on! Who the hell is this guy and did he just call me 'the _junior_ Slayer'?!" screeches Faith.

"EVERYONE! BE QUIET!"

Suddenly returning from upstairs, Joyce Summers manages to outshout all the screaming and yelling teenagers, who stare at her as she descends to the foyer.

"Thank you," says Buffy's mother, now the image of calm, cool, and collected. "Now, kids – Faith, look at me. I'm talking to you too – Spike just helped Buffy rescue me and Giles from a terrible ordeal. He is my guest just like any of you, and you are not to harm him or threaten to harm him."

Xander's mouth flops open like a fish out of water, and even Willow, who had a lot more warning, is thunderstruck by Spike's apparent welcome into the Summers' family.

"Mrs. Summers, he's a dangerous vampire," Oz whispers, surprisingly the first who dares to speak out of all the chastised and astonished teenagers.

"And it's exactly that dangerousness that allowed him to save us," counters Joyce. "I know you all have had less than pleasant encounters with him in the past, but Spike has a very strong reason for reforming, _don't you, dear_?" She addresses this final part to Spike, raising her voice so he can hear her over the whistling of the water kettle.

"Yes, Mum," he calls back, teasingly proper. "Are we really out of the cocoa packets with the little marshmallows?"

"Let me see if I can help you find some," smiles Joyce, stepping between the teens and joining Spike in the kitchen. The moment she rounds the corner, all of Buffy's friends burst out in arguments.

" _Spike_ is in your _house_?!" splutters Xander. "Oz, gimme that cross. We gotta make sure she's not a vamp too!"

"Is this that same vampire guy that broke into the school and Willow and I were trapped in a closet for five hours?!" Cordelia demands. "Because I still have trauma!"

"Did he or did he not call me the _JUNIOR_ Slayer? 'Cuz no way in _hell_ am I the _junior_ Slayer!" yells Faith.

Buffy stands silently in the middle of the group, letting herself be subjected to Xander waving Oz's cross around in front of her nose, just gazing into Willow's eyes as if she could telepathically beg her best friend to see things from her side.

"Are ya done?" she finally mumbles, once Xander lowers the cross and Willow quietly replies in the affirmative to Cordelia's question.

"Actually, yeah. I have to research a paper on Bosnia due Monday," Cordelia pouts, straightening her coat. "I wasn't gonna bother if Buffy had died. I'm sure Giles would have given me a note. But now that she's not dead anymore, I've got to go hit the books."

"B-but we all came here in Oz's car. Are you just gonna walk?" Willow reminds her.

"I guess so." Cordy steps to the front door, but before she can leave, Buffy suddenly remembers.

"Oh, Cordelia! What did you have to do that time your car got towed?"

Cordelia sighs petulantly. "Do you _have_ to remind me? Shesh. The towing company took it out to their lot. There was a fine. And they totally didn't care that I had a perfectly legitimate reason for how I'd parked my car."

" 'Cuz you're bad at parking?" offers Xander.

"No!"

"You were saving the second spot for someone else?" suggests Oz with a grin.

"No!"

"Oh! Your car squiggled around after you parked!" Willow chimes in, glad to help steer the conversation away from accusations on Buffy.

"No!" shouts Cordelia, now blushing and infuriated.

"Buffy, luv?"

The five standing teens wheel around as Spike enters from the kitchen, and Buffy can't help but bite her lip, just a little. He's rolled up the borrowed ivory shirt's sleeves to display his alabaster forearms, and his hair looks like he's daubed some water on it, taming the platinum fluff into slicked curls.

"Mum asks if you know where the phone book is?" he asks, perfectly demure and gentlemanly. Beside Buffy, Cordelia blinks a few times, trying to reconcile the grotesque-faced monster of her memory with this… for want of a better term, _angel_ , all white skin and hair, almost glowing.

" _Meeee-ow_ ," Faith mutters, appraising the vampire with hooded eyes and apparently quite ready to forget the slight on her Slayer status.

Xander gags and splutters. "It… what… _him_! You're meowing at _him_?!"

"Nice to see you too, mate," Spike smirks at the boy. "Hope there're no hard feelings 'bout the whole kidnapping deal. Eh, Red?"

"Uh… I… er…" Willow turns pink and steps behind Oz.

"Cordy, didn't you say something about a paper?" Buffy gently reminds her other stunned friend.

Still a bit bug-eyed, Cordelia nods without turning her head toward Buffy – so it looks more like she's giving Spike a thorough once-over – and then she takes a couple uneven steps in the direction of the front door and finally manages to slip out of it. Faith, meanwhile, stands and approaches Spike, and to Buffy's fury, she does 'that thing' with her hands on her hips and elbows pointed back, accentuating her cleavage. Buffy has tried to replicate it, but no amount of practicing that move in the mirror has made it look anything but ridiculous on her, yet Faith somehow manages to pull it off flawlessly every time.

"Hey," the brunette Slayer practically purrs at Spike. "I'm Faith."

"Spike," he replies by way of introduction, his eyes on her eyes and not one inch lower. "Or 'Bloody Will', but only among pals."

"O-kay," Buffy interrupts, sending Faith a glower. She slams the front door behind Cordelia, rushes to the living room desk, and digs the phone book out of the drawer. "Uh… there can't be many towing companies in a pedestrian-friendly town this size. Should be easy to find."

"Thanks, sweet'eart," Spike murmurs. When Buffy approaches him with the phone book, he reaches both hands toward her – one to slip the thick phone book out of her hand, and the other to cup her hair gently and draw her in. In full view of the four other guests, Spike gives Buffy's forehead two quick kisses – two distinct little squeaks of his lips against her skin, as if showing such affection for her is the most natural, unquestionable thing in the world – and then steps around her and spreads the book out on the desk.

The Summers' living room is deathly quiet for about five seconds, Buffy lightly blushing, Xander and Oz paralyzed in surprise, and Willow's head working overtime. _So he's a vampire and he has no soul, but he's being nice and not evil, and Buffy let him kiss her! Did she ever let Angel kiss her in front of us? Then again, Angel was never really the 'around other people' type, let alone with the kissing. And after last year and the very very bad result of the kissing… I guess Buffy really meant what she said, that Spike is nothing like Angel._

Then at last Faith lets out a long sliding-tone whistle. "Gosh. B. sure knows how to pick the undead hotties."

Xander gags again. "Sp… pick the… _Spike_?! Buffy's with _Spike_?!"

"Uh, Willow, I get the funny feeling that Buffy broke up with Angel," Oz whispers subtly to his girlfriend, taking the situation as calmly as most other everyday life occurrences.

"Yup," she nods. "She, um, she told me on the phone."

"Gotcha."

"Eh, you're right, luv," Spike says suddenly, making most of the Scoobies jump at the sound of his voice, still getting used to hearing it as upbeat and casual instead of life-threatening. "Only got the one. Sunnydale Towing. Bet they're the ones who took it."

"Okay. I dunno if they'd be open on Sunday, but you can always call and find out," Buffy advises. "I'm gonna have some breakfa– … you know what. It's my post-birthday. I can have whatever meal I want, and this Slayer tummy says 'peanut butter and jelly'. Coming, guys?"

Oz and Willow follow her into the kitchen without question, and Faith soon steps in line behind them, her eyes unmistakably checking out the back view of Spike as he bends over the phone book and dials the number. Xander moves more slowly, his hand still clenched tight on Oz's cross.

"Yes, I'm callin' about a black 1959 DeSoto Adventurer that is missin' from the lot out by city hall," Spike says brightly when someone at Sunnydale Towing answers his call. "The vehicle would've been removed sometime yesterday before nine p.m."

"You… you have a vintage DeSoto Adventurer?" asks Xander. All the spite – and most of the air – has disappeared from his voice, as though Spike has just flaunted a gigantic tub of chocolate candy right in front of his face.

The vamp grins. "Yeah. It's a real sweet ride."

"Neat." Xander suddenly shakes his head and backs up away from Spike, getting closer to the kitchen. "Er, I mean… you probably stole it. You're evil and stuff."

"Keep tellin' yourself that, kiddo," Spike smirks, then refocuses on the voice on the phone line. "Yes, the DeSoto… Uh-huh… What?… What the soddin' hell do you mean by 'A HUNDRED DOLLAR FINE'?!" he roars, still in human face, but just barely. "You're the berk who bloody hauled my car there in the first place! You ruddy-well ought-a be payin' ME for it! Did I mention it's BLEEDIN' NINETEEN-FIFTY-NINE VINTAGE!"

"Volume, please, dear," calls Joyce from the kitchen, busy helping the teenagers gather ingredients for their peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

"Sorry, Mum," Spike whispers repentantly, holding the phone's mouthpiece to his chest so the employee of Sunnydale Towing can't hear his softer tone. He twists the cord in one hand, puts the receiver back against his ear, and growls threateningly. "A'right, now you listen here, chum. I'm gonna come stormin' over there… and when I get there, so help me, if I find one, just ONE bleedin' SCRATCH on my car…"

"I can't believe Giles was fired. How could Giles get fired?" mumbles Willow, her shocked tone barely audible underneath Spike's continuing terrorization of the towing employee.

"Apparently realizing that a supposedly sacred tradition is actually really stupid, cruel, and totally a male-power-complex thing is a major no-no in the Watcher rules," Buffy shrugs, swiping the last bit of peanut butter from the very bottom of the jar onto a bread slice. "Mom, do we have another jar?"

"In the pantry, dear."

As she scoots off her stool and hunts for the jar, Buffy pauses a moment, wondering what secret superpowers her mom has. How else could she get kidnapped by a bloodthirsty sadistic vampire but still manage to keep the pantry stocked for a horde of hungry teenagers?

"So how did you manage to kill Kralik?" asks Oz as Buffy hops back on her stool, Xander and Willow on the other side of the island mixing a pitcher of lemonade.

"Oh, she was very clever," gushes Buffy's mother before the Slayer can say anything. At her daughter's half-grinning, half-exasperated look, she rubs Buffy's shoulder, beaming. "Oh, you go ahead and tell it dear. You tell it better."

"Well, he had these pills. I think they were like blood vitamins or something, or maybe they had some kind of anti-crazy meds. Anyway, I poured holy water into the glass he had to drink his pills with, so he pretty much did all the work for me."

"Never thought holy water could actually make a difference in a fight," Faith mutters, whittling away at her stake with one of the Summers' nicer kitchen knives.

"Now, when you say 'fired', do you mean ' _fired_ '?" asks Willow, begging clarification for the ump-teenth time.

"You're not cruising past that concept anytime soon, are you, Will?" chuckles Xander.

"Talkin' to me, kid?" Spike smirks as he strolls in from the living room.

"No, Spike, you're 'Bloody Will'. Willow is just 'Will'," grins Buffy, letting her vampire slink up behind her and hug one arm around her waist, snatching a sandwich right out from under Xander's fingertips. The boy scowls and makes a dry-heaving face when Mrs. Summers's back is turned, but Willow smiles, again surprised by the ease and affection between the two blonds.

"Yeah, shesh, Pasty, get with the program," Faith says snidely, but her face belies her feigned distaste with the blond vampire, still looking him over, a lusty glint in her eyes.

"So what's the sitch on your car?" asks Buffy with a soothing smile.

Spike sighs grumpily, swallowing his mouthful of sandwich. "Blighters are gonna make me hawk up a hundred bob to get it back. Oh, and here's the sweet part. Didn't even tow it 'cause of me parkin' all cross-wise or runnin' over the sign or anythin'. Towed it on account of it bein' ' _an obstruction to the visitor parking for city hall_ '. On a bleedin' Saturday, with nothin' goin' on to attract any stinkin' visitors at all."

"I'd blame the Watcher-replacing guys, but from their whiny attitudes I don't think they'd gotten here yet when we found out your car was missing," offers Buffy. "All that ' _ten-hour-flight, blah, blah, mollycoddling, blah, blah, you're fired, blah_ '. What is 'molly-coddling' anyway?"

"Are you _sure_ they fired Giles?" Willow begs yet again before Spike can stop chuckling enough to answer.

"Yes!" say Buffy and Xander in unison.

"Well, it's just… he's been _fired_. He's, he's unemployed! He's… between jobs!"

"Giles isn't going anywhere, Will," says Buffy comfortingly. "He's still librarian."

"Okay… but I'm writing an angry letter!" the red-haired witch proclaims.

"You know, nothing's really going to change. The important thing is that I kept up my special birthday tradition of gut-wrenching misery and horror."

"Bright side to everything," notes Oz.

"And the birthday tradition of Lunchables, apparently," Spike whispers in her ear. "Thought you said that part wasn't so bad, eh?"

Grinning, Buffy nudges him with her shoulder, still trying to open the second peanut butter jar. "I'll just feel better when I've got my strength back, and I figure out how much of a pain in the butt this Wesley guy's gonna be."

"Yeah, new Watcher," snorts Faith, hacking viciously at the tip of her new stake. "At last, someone who'll be _more_ of a Scooby outcast than me."

"Give you a hand with that, little lady?" grins Xander, watching Buffy struggle with the peanut butter.

"You're loving this _far_ too much," she scowls daggers at him, but nevertheless hands over the jar.

"Admit it. Sometimes you need a big… strong… man… um," he laughs nervously, equally unable to open the container. "Will, gimme a hand with that?"

"Don't mind if I do, Xander." Smirking devilishly, Spike swipes the jar right out of the boy's hands and pops off the lid with barely any effort.

"Show off," Xander gripes.

"This is gonna get so confusing," mumbles Willow.

Yet, as the young witch watches Buffy exchange a beaming smile with the slim blond vampire, 'confusing' seems an easy price to pay.

**The End.**


End file.
